Rainbow Generation
by Spritlezy
Summary: At the end of elementary school, Hinata Shouyou moves to the bustling city of Tokyo to start a new life. Say hello to the Generation of Miracle's little ball of sunshine.
1. Stupid Rain

**11/17: I'm kind of sad yet glad that I made Teiko different that it actually is. As far as I know, Teiko is actually a pretty average school. It's just the basketball club that's fairly well known. Well, it's too late to change it now, and I can still use the idea for other stuff I have planned, so I'm just going to keep rolling.**

* * *

 **Chapter 1: Stupid Rain**

It was early April when Shouyou said his final goodbyes to everyone he ever knew. His worn-out sneakers splashed in the puddles on the damp pavement as the brilliant sunlight reflected off the water droplets on the budding branches and the black metal of their rented car. Why was it shining so brightly on such a sad day?

He looked at his dear friends from elementary school all giving him big grins, the old couple down the road that always gave him sweets to eat, and his aging teachers whom had put up with all his spazzy antics for the past six years. His mother walked over and patted his head, "Come on, Shouyou. It's time."

He could feel the tears pricking the back of his eyes, but he refused to give in. He forced his face into a big smile and stood up straight with the box of homemade sweets that the old couple gave him in a tight grip, determined not to show his true emotions because then he'd look weak. He was almost thirteen now. He was old enough to handle this.

His little sister, Natsu, on the other hand, was only about seven years old. He knew she tried to be like him, tried to act tough for everyone, but she was smart. She knew they were leaving and that she wouldn't be able to see any of her friends for a good long while. She knew, and as a little kid, she couldn't handle the emotional stress. Her tears and sobs drowned out the pretty sounds of the birds chirping above.

The delicate crystal cup that held Shouyou's near-overflowing emotions and tears clinked against hers, knowing exactly how she felt. And then, it shattered. It broke so easily and so quickly that Shouyou didn't know why he even bothered to spend all those months building it in the first place. The tears escaped first, trickling down his cheeks as his lips twitched. A shard flew away and cracked another cup, then that cup fell and cracked another, and again, and again, and again.

Like dominoes, one by one, all his friends hung their heads and started crying their eyes out just like the six-year-olds next to them. Shouyou wasn't any better. In fact, he was the worst. He absently wondered why the sun was still shining and wished for the rain to come back. At least then he'd have an excuse.

He felt his mother run her fingers through his wild orange hair soothingly. She didn't say anything, and Shouyou was kind of glad that she didn't. He was sure that he would revert back to a baby if she said anything. He didn't want to embarrass himself even more.

He heard the window of the car scroll down, and he knew his dad was signaling his mom to get him and Natsu to go already because, geez, he looked like a real idiot standing on the side of the road crying like he had just broken all his favorite toys. Move, legs, move! It's time to go! He really wished it would start raining. Maybe then his legs would move if only to prevent him from getting sick.

He had known they were going to be moving for months now. He'd even gotten an extra week due to some mix-up that happened. He'd prepared several days ahead, too. It had been the first time he had ever prepared for anything that wasn't on the day before.

But his legs didn't listen to him. They refused. He knew why. His brain was all ready to move on to the big city, but his heart wasn't. After months of denial, he finally admitted it.

He wasn't ready to move on.

* * *

A few weeks later, it was late April, when all the cherry blossoms were in full bloom and students overran the streets in preparation for the start of the new school year. One particular head of orange could be seen standing just outside the gates of his new school, Teiko Junior High. He tugged at his tie and light blue collar under the stark white suit.

Honestly, he didn't like how uptight this school seemed. When he put on his new favorite hoodie under the white suit top instead of wearing the required blue dress shirt that morning, his mother blew a gasket. Apparently, the dress code was strictly enforced here. Hinata sighed. Hopefully it was just the uniforms.

He shifted his bag up onto his shoulder again—the handles really weren't good at their job—and looked around. There were a lot of tables set up for the clubs, some with posters, but most of them just had piles of paper on them. He glanced at a few posters, but nothing caught his interest (he didn't just look at the pictures… honestly!). He passed by a large group of girls giggling and blushing. It irked him a bit (a lot!) to find out that he was barely taller than the girls here.

As he continued on, he spotted a few groups wearing different jackets and deduced that they were the sports clubs at this school. A pang went through his heart when he remembered Izumi and Kouji and their daily squabbles over which sport was better and which team Hinata should join in Junior High.

Maybe he should try soccer to figure out what Kouji was always talking about. He'll try basketball, too, of course, for Izumi. And maybe some other sports. He'd never had a preference for any particular sport. He just wanted to move and exert himself, to feel the adrenaline rush through his body, and to push himself to his limits and beyond. He couldn't sit in one spot for so long; his body couldn't handle the idleness. That was the main reason why he had such terrible grades.

He walked by all the sports tables, grabbing a sheet from each and signing himself up with a note saying "test" on all of them. In hindsight, he should've put down something more like "trial" so that the people who read his applications didn't all tilt their heads in confusion. But, Hinata Shouyou was a creature of instincts and abysmal grades. It wasn't likely he even knew the word.

When he approached the volleyball table, he saw something that amazed him and annoyed him to no end. Surrounded by members from various sports clubs and a head taller than them all was a guy with lavender hair that could only be described as giant. Oh, how Hinata wished he were that tall. It must feel amazing to be able to look down on other people instead of up. Down here, he always had to watch out for other people or else he'd get knocked down and trampled.

The giant looked at all the sports club members with a bored expression. His eyes caught onto the bright dot of orange that was Hinata's hair, and Hinata had to suppress a shiver. As much as he admired tall people, they scared him, too. He ducked behind the crowd of people to avoid the tall boy's gaze and quickly went on his way with his bag gripped in his shivering hands. He can sign up for volleyball later.

After he made sure the giant behind him wasn't looking for him, Hinata redirected his eyes to see where he was walking. The first thing he saw was the Teiko emblem on someone's uniform. The next thing to happen was a blur even to him. His body spun and twisted to avoid collision, and he somehow ended up behind the person with his bag falling from the sky and into his hands. It took a moment for his mind to catch up with his body, but he eventually regained enough sense to splutter an apology to the cat-eyed redhead he nearly bumped into. The taller boy raised his hand to stop Hinata's blabbering, "I'm fine, really."

"Y-you sure? I didn't hit you by mistake or anything, right? Maybe you just can't feel it right now?"

Before the redhead could respond, Hinata jumped, "Oh no! I totally forgot I was supposed to go see the teacher before class!"

He apologized again before running off, never giving the other boy a chance to ask his name.

He found the administrative office easy enough, but his teacher wasn't there, so he went on a wild goose chase for a while looking for her. Once he found her, she told him that he had to go back to the administrative office to get his schedule. Hinata grabbed his head. Why hadn't he thought to ask first?

He ran back to the office and got his schedule with a brief scolding from a balding teacher about running in the school. He knew he was close to running late now since there wasn't anyone in the hallways anymore. Class 1-5. That had to be the first floor, right? Dang it, this was confusing! His elementary school only had one floor.

Despite the teacher's warning, Hinata ran to his classroom, skidded past it, ran back, and then jumped through the door just as the bell rang. He swiped his arms in front of him, "Safe!"

"Eh-hem."

Hinata stilled at the voice behind him. He shakily cranked his head to see his teacher tapping her clipboard on her shoulder, clearly unamused. She stared down at him, "You're supposed to be in your seat when the bell rings."

Hinata's heart was slowly sinking.

"But, technically, you're not late."

Hinata's face lit up.

"Go take a seat so that I can start class."

"Yes, ma'am!" Hinata saluted her, earning a few chuckles from his new classmates, and turned to find a seat. Immediately, he noticed the purple-haired giant from earlier sitting in the farthest window seat and, much more sadly, the only empty seat left next to him. Hinata hesitated, but a stern verbal shove from the teacher got him going. Still, he cautiously approached the giant, using the other row of desks like a wall as he shimmied to his seat. His eyes never left that head of purple, not even when he sat down.

He was sure the giant knew he was being stared at, and he was right because the taller boy locked his violet eyes with Hinata's big brown ones. Just like last time, a shiver ran through Hinata's body, and he hurriedly looked for the closest person he could hide behind, but they were in class, everyone in their seats, so he had no one he could use. Instead, he nervously raised his hand in a shaky wave, "H-hey."

The giant blinked, slow and jaded, and then he redirected his attention to the teacher, who had just begun roll call. Hinata put his hand down with the tiniest bit of annoyance. As scared as he was of tall people, he hated being ignored even more.

Class started. Hinata tried to concentrate and take notes like a good student. Honestly, he did. He really tried. But, he just wasn't born to sit still for long periods of time unless it involved sleeping. He needed something to do. It started with shaking his leg, then twirling his pencil, and then tapping his fingers on the desk. He settled with doodling in his notebook, foregoing grades because he just couldn't concentrate even if he tried. Maybe later in the year, but not now.

At some point, Giant-san took out a bag of potato chips and started munching on them during class. It didn't look like the teacher cared too much, though she did send a hard glare his way at a particularly loud crunch. For Hinata, the sounds were unbearable. He had finally managed to control his insatiable desire to move, but the crunches and crackles of the chips and plastic bag were really getting on his nerve. He couldn't even go to sleep. Finally, Hinata snapped.

The ginger slammed his hands onto his desk and stood up, "Would you stop that?! I already can't concentrate, and you're just making it worse! I can't even sleep! And I finally found a good spot, too! Why are you even eating in class anyway?!"

"Eh-hem!"

Hinata stopped his shouts.

"Hinata-san, hallway."

"Eh?! But what about him?!"

"Hinata-san. Hall. Way."

"Yes, ma'am," Hinata sighed dejectedly and left the room.

"I can't believe I got in trouble on the first day," Hinata muttered and changed his grip on the buckets he was holding. He was surprised a high-end school like Teiko still did the bucket punishment. He pouted, "This is all his fault. Stupid giant."

As Hinata was muttering to himself, a tall blunet with nicely tanned skin walked by, sipping on a juice box. The tall boy looked at the orange-haired shrimp grumbling to himself while holding two buckets filled with water. He blinked at the odd sight, and when Shrimpy look up at him with big chocolate-brown eyes, he spat his banana milk in his face and laughed.

"Woah! You managed to get in trouble before me! HA! You must be a real idiot!"

"Hey! Don't call me an idiot, idiot!"

"An idiot who can't use anything but idiot as an insult! So this is a true idiot!"

"What does that say about you?!"

"HAHAHAHAHA! Seriously! It isn't even lunch break yet!"

"Shut up! It's that stupid giant's fault! And you got my uniform dirty!"

The tanned boy continued to laugh while Hinata gritted his teeth and growled at him. The door to the classroom slammed open, making Hinata stand rigid in fear. The taller boy in front of him continued laughing obnoxiously loud. Hinata hissed for him to stop, but it was too late. His teacher stood at the open door with a menacing aura and a haunting glare that made Hinata shrink behind his offender just a little bit.

"You two!" The two boys jumped in their skins. "Since you're having such a good time together, you can serve your punishment together, too."

She left them both standing in the hallway next to Class 1-5, each holding two buckets filled to the brim with newly-added clean water, "Spill one drop and I'm extending your time."

Hinata could feel the burn in his arms now. He had already been holding half-filled buckets for about half an hour before that blue-haired idiot came by. He really didn't need any more of this. Said idiot noticed the subtle shaking of Hinata's arms and smirked, "So the idiot's not only stupid but weak, too."

Hinata jerked in his spot, really wanting to give a good punch to the jerk's sneering face, but then he remembered the extra amount of water he was carrying. He quietly seethed in his spot, but he decided to give the bluenet a grin along with a mean look, hoping that he could sense all the irritation Hinata was sending, too, "I've been doing this longer than you, jerk, so I already won."

He saw the taller boy's eye twitch, "This doesn't count at all. No way a shrimp like you could beat me in anything."

Hinata shifted to face him with a tic mark on his forehead, "Don't call me a shrimp!"

"Would you prefer squirt, midget, bug? Oh, how about Chibi-chan?"

"Stop giving me weird names, ganguro!"

"Ganguro?! At least I'm not as pale as a baby! You even have the baby face to go with it!"

"I'm not pale at all! Get your eyes checked, you stupid-"

The door slammed open. The teacher poked her head out to look at them, her pretty face marred with straining veins, "Don't make me keep you after lunch break, too!"

She slammed the door shut with even more force, causing the two boys to flinch slightly. They didn't say anything for a while, making sure the teacher wouldn't suddenly come back to check on them unsuspectingly. When they deemed it safe, they returned to glaring at each other. The bluenet frowned at the shorter boy, "This is your fault."

"Hah?!"

He brought his face down and hissed, "Ssssshh! Quiet!"

Hinata immediately shut his mouth. They glanced toward the door and waited. After heart-wrenching minutes of staring at the closed door with held breaths, they both sighed in relief when the door stayed closed. Hinata huffed, "This is _your_ fault. You ruined my uniform. You owe me."

"Huh? No way."

"You do!" Hinata hissed.

"Do not."

"Yes, you do!"

"I do not. Just go home and wash it."

"If I go home with this, my mom will freak."

"Well, she's _your_ mom. I have nothing to do with it."

"You ruined it in the first place!"

The bell signaling the lunch hour rang. Students scurried out of the classrooms to explore or look for their friends. The tanned boy put down the buckets and started walking away, but Hinata wasn't done with their conversation just yet. "Hey!"

The boy turned. Hinata put down his buckets, too, ignoring the stares of the few students passing by who turned their heads at his shout. He locked his brown eyes with deep blue ones, "You're going to pay me back for ruining my uniform."

Something shined in those blue depths as their owner grinned a feral grin, "Is that a challenge?"

Hinata smirked and pointed at him with his eyes glowing with determination, "I'm going to win."

The grin broadened, "Bring it!"

The teacher stepped in then. She crossed her arms, but she didn't look too mad at them this time, "Yes, yes. You boys can settle whatever this is _after_ school. Aomine-san, I already informed your homeroom teacher about this recent mishap, so you can go back to your class now. Don't let me catch you making trouble again."

Aomine bowed with a quick thank you before he hurriedly walked back to his classroom. The teacher turned to Hinata next. She nudged her glasses up a bit, "Hinata-san, I'm sure your mother discussed with you how rigorous this school is. We do not stand for failure."

"Y-yes, ma'am!"

"I understand that you just recently moved here from the Miyagi prefecture, so you might not be used to how things work here in Tokyo just yet. However, I shouldn't need to remind you that if you fail to meet our standards, dire consequences will follow."

"Yes, ma'am."

"If you fail to pass the aptitude test next week with a reasonable score in each subject, you will be taken off any clubs you have joined. That includes sports clubs."

Hearing that part made Hinata's heart take a ten-story skydive...

"We make no exceptions for first-years. If you fail the first test, supplementary courses will be added to your schedule for one month. A letter will also be sent home to inform your parents."

...with no parachute…

"At the end of that month, you will be given a test on whichever subjects you didn't get a passing score on."

...head-first…

"Failure to comply will result in your expulsion from Teiko."

"...yes, ma'am." Aaaaand touchdown. He was officially dead. Hinata stared at the ground right before her glossy heels because he couldn't even look at her feet let alone her face. He really should have read the packet Teiko had sent him no matter how big it was.

"I'll expect more from you from now on. You can find me later for the notes you missed."

The shoes disappeared from the top of his view and clicked away with steady footsteps. Hinata stood there for a while longer, ignoring the few students who yelled at him to get out of the middle of the hallway and the others who looked at him with pity in their eyes. Still, he stood there with his fists clenched, thinking back and vainly asking himself why. Why did he have to get lectured? Why did he have to come to Teiko? Why did he have to leave Miyagi?

The second half of class went by without any trouble. Hinata, for once in his life, sat in his seat without feeling the need to run around or jump or sleep or anything. The tip of the mechanical pencil in his slack hand rested against a half-filled page in his notebook, but Hinata had stopped listening to the lesson a while ago.

He kept thinking about his old home and everything he had left behind. He kept reminiscing those good times he had with all his friends, especially his two best friends. They had even wanted to go to the same junior high. He remembered all the goals he had back then upon entering junior high and the plans he had made with Kouji and Izumi. He had hoped that if he joined the basketball and soccer clubs, he'd be able to meet them again. Now, those hopes seemed empty.

He tightened his grip on his pencil. No. What he was doing now was giving up. He couldn't give up. What would they think of him if they saw him now? He just needed to pass this test, right? Right! Couldn't be too difficult. He'll just study a lot, and then he can play on the sports teams and reunite with Izumi and Kouji! He banged his fists onto his desk with renewed spirit, "Right!"

"Eh-hem."

Hinata was suddenly reminded just where he was. He grinned sheepishly at the teacher, thanking the heavens that she didn't do anything but hmph at him. He quietly went back to taking notes, resolving to get the ones he missed from his classmates later.

Once the school bell rang to announce the end of the school day, Hinata bolted out of the classroom, too excited to try out for the teams to dwaddle in the classroom. Which one should he try first? Maybe soccer. Kouji was always going on and on about all the cool moves he saw on television and how he was practicing hard to do it just like the pros. Although, he wasn't too keen on a sport that banned the use of his hands.

While he was changing his shoes, the cat-eyed redhead he nearly ran into that morning approached him, "Excuse me."

Hinata looked up. Despite the fact that the redhead was shorter than the others around them, Hinata was even shorter than him by a few inches. The boy smiled, "My name is Akashi Seijuro. We met briefly this morning."

"Hinata Shouyou," Hinata bowed slightly. This person had that kind of aura that demands respect. It wasn't like his teacher, whom always became extremely scary and frightened Hinata into listening to her, though he would have listened to her regardless because she was his teacher. Akashi's aura didn't induce that feeling of fear. It was more like… reverence.

"Hinata-san—"

"Oh! Just Hinata is fine."

"Hinata, then," Akashi started again, "What club do you plan to join?"

"Sports!" Hinata answered immediately, "Mostly soccer and basketball! But I wanna try the others, too!"

Akashi blinked. He had expected to hear basketball, considering their run-in that morning, and maybe even American football. He certainly hadn't expected the boy to say every sports club offered at Teiko. He supposed that was okay since Teiko allowed one to join multiple clubs so long as they did well in all of them and kept up their studies. "I see. Do you want to walk to the gym together? I'm planning to try out for the basketball team."

"Sure!" Hinata jumped at the opportunity. He had spent his entire lunch period sulking and barely ate a thing, so he hadn't had the chance to make any friends yet. Normally, he was the one who approached people. It was kind of nice being the one to be asked this time.

"So Akashi-san, what class are you in?" Hinata walked out the door with a little skip to his step.

Akashi followed at a more moderate pace, "Class 1-1."

"Eh?! But, that's the really advanced class, isn't it? You must be really smart!" The class divisions had been on the first page of the pamphlet. Never let it be said that Hinata never tried.

"Hmm, I guess."

"Wow. I'm in Class 1-5. I sit next to this really tall guy. He's, like, six feet tall! Totally HUUUUGE! And this is middle school! Insane, right?!"

Akashi just smiled and nodded, but he kept his eyes on Hinata to show that he was paying attention. Hinata continued, "He kept eating during class. I didn't even know half the stuff he brought out, but they were all snacks. Even for lunch he had a bunch of plastic bags and wrappers all over his desk. Thinking about it now makes me hungry. I didn't eat much of my lunch today."

"Why not?"

"Ehhh…" Hinata hesitated, "I, uh, wasn't in the mood."

Akashi just hummed, though it didn't look like he believed him at all. He changed the topic, "What happened to your uniform?"

"Ah! Is it that noticeable?!" Hinata pulled at his white jacket, trying to find the faint yellow stains.

"Stupid ganguro," Hinata muttered. Akashi heard the comment but didn't say anything. He opened the door to the gym. There were only a few people warming up since they were fairly early. Once they checked in with the coach, they headed for the locker rooms. When they walked in, Hinata stopped suddenly. He jutted his pointer finger at a tall tanned boy, who had just finished changing his shirt, and screamed, "It's you!"

Said boy looked up and went through the same motions Hinata just did, "Ah! It's Chibi-chan!"

Hinata had always been self-conscious of his height. That was why he spent all his free time improving his leg muscles to accommodate for it. So now, he had a comeback ready, and if he decided to join basketball or any other sport that focused a lot on height, his opponents _and_ his teammates would do well to remember it, "I may be small, but I can jump!"

"You can jump, huh?" The blunet didn't look the least impressed, but his eyes lit up at the prospect of a challenge even if his opponent was small, "I got worried when I realized you didn't say what you challenged me to. I didn't expect you to join the basketball club, but it all worked out."

"I've only played basketball a few times before, but that's more than enough to take you down."

Aomine gave him a small wave as he walked by, "Hah! I look forward to seeing you try. See you on the court, squirt."

On the basketball court, Hinata gaped at the amount of people that came to try out. Sadly, he was still the shortest, but at least he didn't look as short when he stood next to Akashi. Akashi saw his wide eyes and explained, "Teiko is known as an all-around good school, but it's basketball club is the best of the best."

"That's awesome! Just look at all the people!" Hinata scanned the mass of people. This was one of those times when he wished he was taller so that he could see just how many people were really there. Speaking of tall people, he spotted Giant-san on the other side of the court. He couldn't mistake that huge body and purple hair anywhere.

"Yo, Chibi-chan!"

"Stop calling me that!"

Aomine just laughed, "Hey, I heard that no one gets onto the first string when they first try out, so how about it? Whoever gets onto the first string first, wins."

Hinata grinned. Like Aomine, he also loved a challenge, "You're on! But first, I wanna know your name."

"Oh, that's right. We didn't do that yet, huh? My name's Aomine Daiki. You?"

"Hinata Shouyou."

"Hinata," Aomine muttered. He started laughing suddenly, "It totally fits your hair!"

"Hey! That's an insult, isn't it?! You just insulted me!"

Before he could really start ranting, the coach blew his whistle. After a quick introduction and some formalities, the coaches divided all the students into groups and then directed them to doing several drills to test their abilities. First up was shooting practice. Each of them were to take five shots from five specific spots on the court.

Hinata had played basketball only during gym class or when Izumi needed someone to practice with. Other than that, he didn't have much experience at all, so it really didn't surprise him when all his shots missed or rebounded. He was still annoyed, though.

Akashi went after him. Hinata watched the ball leave the redhead's hands and make a clean swish into the hoop. Akashi did it with such ease, too. Hinata watched the other four shots land in the hoop one after the other, a nice swish with every one. Two of the balls hit the rim, but they still went in. When Akashi was done, Hinata bounded over to him, "That was awesome! They all went _woosh_ , and then _fooph_ or _bam_! Hey, hey! Can you teach me how to do that?!"

Akashi gave him a small smile just to be nice, "I'm sure you can do it without my help."

Aomine walked over when he was done with his round―he missed the last one from the 3-point line―with his unnecessary but totally necessary comment, "A guy like him isn't going to help a dunce like you. You missed all five shots."

"Shut up! I'll get better! You'll see!"

"Sure, sure. I still win this round!"

"What? We weren't even competing!"

Why couldn't they have been farther apart when the coaches assigned groups?

The next drill was a stamina test. Hinata and Aomine deliberately picked spots next to each other to make sure that neither of them cheated. They did jumping jacks, push-ups, stretches, and much more. Aomine's breathing started getting labored on their fifth set of jumping jacks, but Hinata was just getting started. At the end, Aomine had a noticeable layer of sweat on his forehead, but Hinata was still bouncing with energy.

Hinata smiled at him, "I win this time."

Aomine just growled a bit.

Next up: running laps. Basically, how many laps around the gym can you run in five minutes?

Hinata had a rough start with this one, being pushed around at the starting line―darn his short stature―but he caught up to Aomine, who was the leader of the pack, soon enough. The two shared a look and increased their speed. Everything around them became a blur. The only thing that mattered to them was beating the other. The other students had to run against the walls lest they be mowed down by the crazy duo constantly passing them. By the time the coach blew the whistle, Aomine and Hinata were both dripping with sweat and panting like hyenas.

"A… tie…!" Aomine gasped out between taking big breaths. Hinata grunted and nodded his agreement, also having trouble getting enough air into his lungs.

The rest of the tests continued in this pattern. Aomine would win one, Hinata would win the next one, and then they would tie on the third one. Unfortunately for them, the number of trials was divisible by three.

It was finally time to announce their placements. The third string members were all grouped together by the third string coach. The second string members went to stand by the coach calling their placements. It made Hinata kind of nervous when he didn't hear his name.

"I will now announce the first string."

Hinata straightened his back and tensed even more as the names were being called.

"Number 8, Aomine Daiki." The tanned jerk sent a mocking smirk at him as he walked over to the coach.

"Number 11, Midorima Shintaro; Number 23, Murasakibara Atsushi." Ah, it's that tall guy in his class!

"Number 29, Akashi Seijuro." Hinata brightened and sent Akashi an excited smile, and then…

"Number 30, Hinata Shouyou."

Hinata couldn't believe his ears. The coach continued to say a few words, but Hinata wasn't listening anymore. He vaguely heard Aomine's voice shouting that he had won their competition, but it wasn't until he heard Akashi congratulating him that he realized he actually did it. He made it onto the first string! That meant he could play in games. He was one step closer to reuniting with his friends from Miyagi. And then, Aomine ruined his good mood, "I win! I got onto the first string first!"

A tic appeared on Hinata's forehead, "Hey! I made it, too!"

"But my name was called first, so I win!"

"I don't accept that!" Hinata's stomach growled then. He crumbled to the floor holding his stomach, "I'm so hungry. I really should've eaten my lunch."

Past the loud voices of the crowd, Hinata's ears picked up a noise he became very familiar with over the first school day. His head shot up and looked around for a tall head of purple hair. Lo and behold, the purple-haired member of the first string stood towering over Hinata's small form, eating from a bag of flavored pretzel sticks.

Murasakibara caught Hinata's sparkling eyes staring at his pretzel sticks and looked between the two. He thought Hinata's staring was a bit creepy. It made him want to crush Hinata's tiny head, but the longer he looked at him, the more he thought the small ginger looked like a tiny gerbil begging for food. As much as he loved his snacks, Murasakibara felt inclined to feed him. He picked up the next stick by the tip, crouched down and held it out. Hinata took the bait and bit it without even taking it from his hands.

Aomine snickered next to them, "Are you a dog? Nah, you look more like a tiny rabbit."

The coach with the sunken cheeks clapped his hands to get their attention, "Maybe you've already heard, but we don't usually pick first string players from this test. So, consider yourselves special. I have high hopes for all of you."

In the locker rooms after a briefing from the coach, Hinata once again challenged Aomine, saying that their competition wasn't over yet. He also went around greeting the other two new first string members.

The carrot top named Midorima gave him a bottle of hand cream after he asked Hinata when his birthday was. He also said something about one day off and being last in luck, but Hinata didn't understand any of that. After that, Midorima left. Akashi followed suit, saying something about family business. Shame; Hinata wanted to walk home with him.

The other one was Murasakibara. Hinata had trouble saying his name, or actually he just thought it was too long and too much of a bother to say all the time. When he thanked Murasakibara for the food, the ginger was only stared at by bored violet eyes. Hinata instinctively hide behind the closest person, who unfortunately happened to be Aomine, and shakily challenged the giant's stare, "Y-you wanna fight?"

Murasakibara stood up, making Hinata duck behind Aomine. Considering the difference in height, it was no wonder Hinata was cowering in fear. Even Aomine was a little intimidated, "Hey, hey. He was just kidding. Tell him, Chibi-chan."

"Y-yeah!" Hinata nervously peeked his head out to look at Murasakibara's looming figure. He expected to be punched, kicked, and just plain beat up because it had to be so easy for those big hands to crush his small body like an it was an ant, and he silently apologized to Aomine for getting him involved. The last thing he expected was to be poked in the cheek, "Huh?"

He swatted the finger away when it continuously prodded his cheek, "What are you doing? Stop that."

Murasakibara ignored him and continued his annoying… whatever he was doing. Aomine stood by and watched the scene with a hand over his mouth, making it seem like he was trying to hide his mocking laughter when he really wasn't.

"Shut up, ganguro!" Hinata yelled. He tried to bite Murasakibara's finger the next time it tried to poke him, which ended up making Aomine laugh harder. Instead of going for another poke, Murasakibara put his hand on top of Hinata's head and ruffled his already messy hair. The small ginger was only stopped from jumping onto the giant in rage by someone's shout, "Hey, it's raining!"

Hinata, as well as everyone else in the locker room, looked out the windows to see the glass already covered in water droplets. There hadn't been any sign that a storm was coming, so a lot of people didn't have an umbrella or anything. Those unfortunate students looked up at the already grey sky with disdain. Hinata, thankfully, was not one of them. He took out the pink umbrella his mother thoughtfully packed for him, though he would've liked it in a different color.

Aomine refused to share Hinata's umbrella, stating that it would've felt like he'd lost if he'd accepted, so he ran out into the pouring rain with his bag over his head. That left Hinata standing next to Murasakibara in the doorway. Should he offer? He probably should, but his mind kept picturing himself next to an exaggerated Murasakibara holding a leaf-like umbrella.

'Totoro?!' He was broken out of his thoughts when he heard a sigh next to him. Murasakibara grunted at the rain, and then he looked at Hinata holding the unopened umbrella in his small hands. Hinata followed his gaze and opened the umbrella, "Do you wanna walk home together? Oh, you'll have to hold the umbrella, though. And, uh, I don't know where you live, so we'll probably have to—huh?"

He stopped talking when he was suddenly lifted up by his waist. He almost dropped the umbrella in surprise when he noticed the ground getting farther away. He did flail a little when he realized how easily he was picked up. Murasakibara ignored his thrashing and placed him on his shoulders, "There. Now, you can hold it, and I can eat my snacks without them getting wet."

He said it so simply that it almost made Hinata want to hit him, and it was totally possible since Hinata had Murasakibara's head against his stomach, but Hinata was too caught up in the sights to care. The view was amazing, if a little scary. He was at least seven feet above the ground now. It almost felt like he was flying, but he knew he could very easily fall. It startled him when Murasakibara took the first step.

"Woah! Wait! Hold on!" Hinata flailed his arms and grabbed onto the only thing he could with his free hand: Murasakibara's hair. The giant stopped when Hinata pulled to regain his balance. He directed his eyes to look at Hinata even though he couldn't really see him behind his head, "Don't pull my hair. That hurt."

"Sorry! I'm really sorry!" Hinata bowed his head as best he could, but he highly doubted Murasakibara could see him. Still, he continued. He only stopped when Murasakibara told him to. "Stop moving. If you fall, my chips will get wet."

The ginger apologized again. He steadied himself by putting most of his weight onto Murasakibara's head, "Okay, good to go."

No matter how long they walked, Hinata never got used to the new view. It was a wondrous experience for him seeing things from a different perspective. The pavement was so far away now, and the walls in the neighborhood they were walking through seemed so short compared to this morning. He had never wondered what the top of those walls looked like before, but he was glad he got this chance to see it. It was plain; just a thick white line with pots of flowers on top or other items in some spots, but it made Hinata's heart shiver with excitement, "Amazing! So this is what tall people see all the time?"

When he didn't get a response, he looked down, "Hey, you're really lucky, you know? I've only just passed 150 centimeters, so I'm always looking up at people, especially at school, but you don't have that problem. Must be nice."

Murasakibara just grunted and continued to eat. Hinata continued his one-sided conversation, "Anyway, I'm glad we live close to each other. I'm just assuming that because you're walking the same way I came to school. Oh, but I live farther up that hill, so maybe we don't live that close after all. I take a left here, or was it a right?"

Murasakibara took a right turn. Hinata looked around, "I don't remember this place. Maybe it was left after all. Hey, can you go back?"

Murasakibara kept walking.

"Hey," Hinata pouted a bit at being ignored. Murasakibara took out a box of pocky from his bag before he said something, "My house is this way."

"Oh. Yeah, I guess it would be better if we went to your house first since this is my umbrella."

So, that's what they did. When they got there, however, instead of setting Hinata down on the ground outside, Murasakibara carried him into the house with him. Hinata was too busy trying to figure out what the giant was doing to really struggle against him, not like he could've broken out of his hold if he tried. Not fair, he absently thought, the guy was tall _and_ strong.

And then, Murasakibara held him out to who Hinata assumed was his mother and said, "Can we keep him?"

"HAH?!" Hinata and Murasakibara's mother both screamed.

"H-hold on, Atsushi. You can't just pick up a child and bring him home. His parents must be looking for him."

"U-uhmm," Hinata raised his hand, "Actually, I'm a first-year in middle school. We're in the same class. Also, can you put me down, Murasakibara? My ribs are starting to hurt."

"You're a middle schooler?! I'm so sorry. You're just so small." Hinata looked away sadly. He wasn't that small, was he? This was just a family of monsters, honestly! Even Murasakibara's mother was freakishly tall. She nearly passed her son in height, "Atsushi! Put the poor kid down."

"Ehh? But I wanna keep it."

"What am I, a lost pet?!"

After a short argument between Murasakibara—with Hinata still in his clutches—and his mother, Hinata was allowed to leave when his classmate was sent to his room. The ginger boy walked through the downpour feeling immensely tired, too tired for it to just be the first day of school, "I'm way too tired. I didn't even walk all the way here and I'm so tired. Too much happened today… But, it wasn't bad."

He tilted the umbrella just a little bit so that he could look at the darkening sky. The rain slammed against the pavement in sheets, soaking Hinata's shoes with their stray droplets. He was reminded of the day he had left his home in the Miyagi prefecture, when he had desperately wished it had rained so that their move was delayed even if by only a day. He remembered being immensely sad that day. Rain would have been perfect.

Now, though, there was no reason for it to rain. Hinata was actually pretty happy with how the day went, despite its poor start. The latter half of the day made up for it, in his opinion. He got to meet a bunch of new people—his new teammates, he thought excitedly. It was a great start to his new life, and he was skittish for tomorrow. Maybe living here wouldn't be so bad.

Thunder roared through the air as the clouds decided they wanted to drown him with pellets of rain. Hinata ran for cover under the hanger of someone's doorway. That was scary. It was almost like the weather responded to his thoughts. Nah, he was just overthinking. Kouji had always told him that he shouldn't overthink things because that'd just fry his brain. But if, perhaps, it really did respond to him, why did the weather make it seem like he had just signed his own death warrant?

When the rain was a little lighter, Hinata bolted from his cover, though it was a little tough with an open umbrella. He floored it, wanting to get home before the storm decided to read his mind again and come back full force.

As he ran, he couldn't stop himself from smiling. He didn't understand why, but he was really happy for some reason. At last, he arrived home in one piece. Before he went in, he turned and took one last look at the dull, grey scenery that was the storm's way of trying to dampen his mood. He snickered at the unintended pun, "Stupid rain."

"Shouyou! What happened to your uniform?!"

"Ack!"

* * *

 **Here's my trashcan of ideas that somehow became a somewhat coherent story. 7.5k words for chapter one. Ew.**

 **I'll admit right now that I don't know much about KnB, so the characters will be slightly off. My excuse is that they're all in their first year of middle school, aka 12-13 years old (Japanese schooling system), so they're still children.**

 _ **There will be absolutely no pairings of a romantic sense in this story.**_ **You are free to your interpretations though, and nothing explicit will be said to deny or confirm anything.**


	2. Stressful Days

**Chapter 2: Stressful Days**

The next day, nothing interesting happened during classes. They were just preparing for the introductory test next week. Hinata scrambled to take down all the notes on the board, but even if he did manage to copy them all down—Sensei ate through those chalk sticks like they were candy—it wasn't like he could understand any of it. Firstly, his handwriting and his note's lack of coordinance made them difficult to read. Second, he didn't know how to study at all.

Murasakibara wasn't of any help either. All that guy did was eat and stare at the board with a drowsy expression. Hinata wondered if the purple-haired boy wasn't good at studying either. When Hinata had asked him to help him study that morning, all Murasakibara had said was, "It's a pain." Then he yawned, and Hinata knew that the giant didn't care about this test one bit.

Hinata figured he was better off finding someone else to help him. He would've gone to find Akashi during lunch time, but Murasakibara held him back. Before Hinata could ask what he wanted, the taller boy held a cutely-decorated cube out to him. Hinata stared at the confection with a raised eyebrow, "What? For me? Wha—mmph!"

Murasakibara shoved the candy into his mouth. Okay, Hinata admitted that he might've taken a _little_ bit too long to accept the treat, but he didn't have to force-feed it to him. He probably just wanted to get back to eating the rest of them. Hinata huffed, but his face changed as the flavor of the confection entered his mouth. He didn't know how to describe it, but it was certainly the best wagashi he'd ever had. His lips stretched into an awkward smile as his cheeks reddened at the wonderful taste, "This is amazing! It's really good! Super good! Hey, hey, where'd you get it? Where? C'mon! You gotta tell me!"

Murasakibara picked another one out of the box on his desk and let it drop into Hinata's hands. It also had adorable decorations like the last one, but it was a different kind to the one he just ate. Hinata didn't care, he still popped it into his mouth and savored the new flavors. He examined the fancy box of wagashi Murasakibara had on his desk and had to wonder, "Why do you have wagashi with you anyway? Aren't they supposed to be tea snacks or something? And isn't that a really fancy box?"

"Mom said to give them to you as sorry for yesterday," Murasakibara took out one that looked like a rabbit. He dropped the confection into his mouth as Hinata said, "Eh? Doesn't that mean it's a gift, then? So, why are _you_ eating it?"

"'Cause I want to."

"...You're really an idiot, huh?"

All Murasakibara had to do was look at Hinata with the tiniest hint of hostility, and the small ginger darted behind the nearest classmate, who took just a look at Hinata crouching by his chair before returning to his conversation with his friend. The small boy peeked out from behind the chair only to see Murasakibara take the bento he had left on his desk, "Hey! That's my lunch!"

The taller boy ignored him and opened the box. He looked at its contents and said simply, "So boring."

Hinata scurried over and took it from him, "What do you mean 'boring'? It's a bento. I bet you don't even know what a bento is. You just eat snacks all the time."

Murasakibara stared at him blankly, "Snacks are better."

"They're unhealthy! How can you play basketball with that kind of diet?!"

"But I'm good at basketball."

Hinata faltered at the bold statement. It irked him some that the guy was so confident under his nonchalant disposition, "M-maybe so. But still!"

"It's a pain," Murasakibara ripped open a bag of strangely-flavored chips and proceeded to ignore the rest of Hinata's rambling. "Hey! Don't ignore me, you… you stupid kuma! That's right! You're just like a bear! You're Murakuma now!"

Murasakibara didn't care for his new nickname. It didn't sound like an insult even though Hinata tried to make it seem like one. He didn't understand how he was like a bear at all, but bears were pretty cool, so he didn't care if the jumpy little gerbil decided to use that name for him from now on. The rest of their lunch period was spent like that; Hinata spouting nonsense and Murasakibara not listening to him.

When class ended, Hinata left to try and catch Akashi before he left. When he got to the classroom, however, there was no redhead to be found. Instead, he saw the green-haired boy who gave him the hand lotion yesterday, "Midorima-san!"

Midorima turned, letting Hinata see the bejeweled headband he was wearing. It sparkled in the light and definitely did not look right on the placid and green-haired Midorima. For a second, Hinata forgot what he was going to ask, completely mesmerized by the glittering gems and twirled metal. It wasn't until Midorima addressed him that he snapped out of his daze. "You are… Hinata-san?"

"O-oh! Yeah! Uhh… This is Class 1-1, right? Akashi-san should be here..?"

"He was called down to the administrator's office a few minutes ago."

"I see…. Uhm, can I ask… Why are you wearing that?" Hinata pointed to the shimmering headband.

"It's today's lucky item. Cancer is close to the bottom today, so I must be prepared. Gemini is even worse off. Oha-Asa dictates that it'll be a hectic day for them."

Hinata tilted his head, a completely blank expression on his face to show that he clearly didn't understand what Midorima was saying. Midorima shook his head, "Nevermind. You were looking for Akashi?"

"Oh, right! Gotta find him before he leaves. Thanks, Midorima-san!"

He had planned to go to the administrator's office, but he somehow winded up behind the school. It's his second day here, you can't really blame him for not knowing the layout of the school yet. He didn't turn back though, rather he continued walking around and ended up close to the soccer fields.

"Look out!"

Hinata turned his head to the voice and was instantly met with a ball to the face. Once he regained his bearings, Hinata picked up the soccer ball and flipped it around a few times in his hands. It was much softer than a basketball, but that kick still hurt. He pinched his nose to make sure he wasn't bleeding.

"Over here!" One of the soccer players was waving his hand to get Hinata's attention. The small ginger shifted the ball again, trying to get it to not seem so foreign in his hands. He took a stance, and then passed the ball like he saw Akashi did the day before. It didn't go as far as he thought it would. It didn't even reach the end lines of the field. He ran to pick it up, but one of the other soccer players, a guy with spiky platinum-blond hair, got to it first.

He picked up the ball and looked at Hinata, his stare piercing and aura intimidating. They shared a look for a few seconds before the blond punted the ball back onto the field and ran after it. Hinata watched him run back. Staring into those sharp black eyes, Hinata knew that the guy was a monster, just like Murasakibara. There was no doubt about it. He was an expert at soccer with incredible innate talent. Seeing guys like him sent shivers of excitement through his body. It would be amazing to play against him.

"Hey, Shrimpy! You're late! Get over here!" An old man from the bench on the other side of the field yelled at him. Hinata looked around him for this so called "Shrimpy" but found no one. "I mean you, ya dunce!"

He would be mad at the jab to his height, but he was more confused and startled to feel anything else. He jogged over to the cranky old man, who didn't take his eyes off of his clipboard. "Hinata, right? Put on a penny. You're starting forward."

The old man walked away as the assistant coach blew the whistle, not giving Hinata a chance to ask what was going on. He was pushed to the center of the field and was facing off against the blond guy with the intense eyes before he knew it.

Hinata remembered submitting an application for every sports club at Teiko, but he hadn't been expecting to be put into a practice match right off the bat. Then again, he was late. He hadn't even planned on going to soccer practice—hadn't even known it was that day in all honesty.

The whistle blew, and the game was immediately kicked into action. Literally. The blond kicked the ball to his teammate, who passed it back to him, and then he disappeared right in front of Hinata's eyes. The only thing that indicated his movement was a brief gust of wind against the ginger's face. The whistle blew again. The goal was made before Hinata even turned his head.

How did he get there so fast? What happened in that split second Hinata had closed his eyes? As the tanned blond walked back to his starting position, Hinata's eyes followed him. They made eye contact and continued to stare each other down as the ball was placed by Hinata's feet. The action was barely noticed.

The whistle blew, Hinata kicked the ball to another player wearing a penny, who started running toward the goal with it. He didn't get very far. He ran a few steps, but then the ball disappeared. Hinata caught it this time. The blond wasn't escaping his eye for the second time. He swerved on his heel. He wasn't going to let him score again. He caught up to the blond within a few strides.

The blond took a quick side glance at him, his eyes widening a bit, but that didn't falter his steps. He dribbled the ball around Hinata, passing him with ease, and continued running toward the goal, scoring for another point.

After the whistle blew, the tanned blond turned and walked past Hinata. Hinata tightened his fists. There was no way he could beat the taller boy unless he could run faster. He had to be faster. Much, much faster.

The whistle went off again. The repetitive sound excited Hinata more than annoyed.

The tanned boy started with the same procedural kickoff. Hinata's eyes followed his movements. He could track him this time; he could see! His brain sent out the command, but his body wasn't fast enough to respond to block him in time. No, it wasn't his reaction timing that was bad, the taller boy was just that fast. The blond still got away from him, but not for long. Just like last time, Hinata closed the distance within a couple seconds.

They locked eyes. The blond had been expecting him that time. Hinata glared at the guy. He was so focused on him that he didn't realize the blond was slowing down for a reason. Hinata slammed right into that reason a second later.

 _Bang!_ The goal shook at the impact.

Hinata held his cheek and grumbled in pain. One of the managers, a third-year most likely, brought over with the first aid kit and a bag of ice. As she was administering Hinata's wounds, the blond walked over. Hinata looked up at him, waiting for him to make the first move.

"What's your name?" That simple question made Hinata smile, "Hinata Shouyou. I'm a first-year."

"You don't play soccer, do you." It wasn't a question. The way he said it told Hinata that he knew it was true. Hinata flinched at the pressure the manager was applying to his cheek, "I only played a bit in elementary school. One of my friends wanted to join the soccer team when he got to junior high, and he would get me to practice with him."

He stopped talking when she told him to keep still. The blond waited for her to finish before extending his hand, "Gouenji Shuuya."

Hinata smiled and accepted his offer of helping him up, "Nice to meet you."

* * *

Shoes squeaked, sweat dripped, and the sound of bouncing balls filled the gymnasium along with endless sighs and the thoughts of quitting. Basketball practice was hard, or rather the coach was extremely tough. It seemed more like a national league basketball training program than a middle school club. At least there was one person enjoying himself.

Aomine tossed the ball into the hoop right over his opponent's head, hollering as he did so. Even after all the running and exercises they had to do, he loved basketball too much to have the thought of quitting even cross his mind.

The assistant coach signaled everyone to take a break. Aomine watched a few more people walk out of the gym. How many was that now? A lot. In the many times Aomine's looked at the door, not once had he seen any sign of a small, bouncy ginger coming in yet. "Hey, you. Akashi, right? Where's Chibi-chan?"

The redhead looked over after he finished his last shot, "I assume you mean Hinata. I haven't seen him all day."

Midorima walked over, "He was looking for you when classes ended, Akashi."

"Was he? He could have waited for practice."

"I told him you were in the administrator's office, but I guess he never found it."

A group of people that were leaving was suddenly pushed out of the way by a barreling head of orange. Hinata rushed past everyone and bowed down really low to the elderly coach, "I'm so sorry I'm late!"

The gym went silent at the outburst. Everyone stopped what they were doing to watch. They were all very interested in how the coach would react to his lateness, especially since Hinata was a new first string member. Maybe the coach would decide to kick him off the first string and pick someone else. That's what they were all hoping for.

Coach Shirogane looked like your average, kind old man, but he was actually pretty strict, especially to people he saw potential in. Hinata's sudden appearance did startle him a bit, his display of respect and shouted apology even more so. Finding people like him, who had limitless potential and natural ability but were also kindhearted and pure, was especially rare at Teiko, a school for the elite. At the moment though, Hinata was far from being the ideal player Teiko wanted. The only way for him to improve his currently mediocre skills was to have him play with those in a higher league. That gave him an idea.

He gestured with his hand for Hinata to calm down, "Relax. Why don't you tell me why you were so late? Something to do with the soccer club?"

"How did you know?"

"You're wearing one of their pennies."

Hinata looked down and proceeded to freak out again, "Oh no! I totally forgot!"

Shirogane smiled, "That's alright. You can return it to them later. I assume you practiced with them. Did you have fun?"

Hinata visibly relaxed as a smile graced his face, "Yeah! I met someone really cool! He's super super good at soccer!"

"Is he now? Do you plan to join the first string?"

"First string means I get to play in a lot of games, right? Then yeah! I want to join the first string and play with a bunch of strong people!"

"Is that so?" The coach hummed a smile, "That's too bad then. I'll have to take you off of the basketball club's first string."

An audible gasp went around the gymnasium before absolute hysteria broke out. Hinata was gobsmacked, ignoring the cacophony of noise all around him, "B-but why?! I'm sorry I'm late! I promise it won't happen again!"

The assistant coach blew his whistle. The entire gym went silent as the shrill noise echoed and faded. Whispers still went around, but they too were silenced once Coach Shirogane stood up, "We will have a practice match to decide. Nijimura will pick five second string players to play against you."

"B-by myself?" Hinata shuddered, dread washing over him. There was no way he could win a 1v5. He wasn't even all that good at basketball, only played it with Izumi a few times. He'd never gotten the basics down completely. Heck, dribbling was still a problem for him! The only way he could make a shot was if he could dunk it, but the hoop was ten feet high. And against five other players all of whom will be making it even harder for him to shoot? Impossible.

"Excuse me," Akashi intervened, "Although I don't quite understand your intention, pitting him against five second string players, whom Captain Nijimura will be choosing himself, seems unbalanced and unnecessary."

Shirogane scratched his chin, "I suppose that would be a bit unfair… Alright. Hinata-kun, you may choose four members from the third string to play on your team. Since we're running short on time today, we'll schedule the practice match for Thursday next week. Until then, you're free to do what you like, Hinata-kun."

The implication was there. The "you don't need to come to practice" was most certainly, undeniably there in the way he turned ever so slightly to address Hinata, in the way his lips stretched into that misleading smile, and in the way he turned to walk away. The decision was made. The date was set.

Once the coach was out of sight, Akashi walked over to the shellshocked Hinata, "Hinata-san?"

Oh, he put the honorific back. Force of habit.

He wasn't used to comforting people. He never needed to. Akashi had planned on trying to comfort the poor boy—or maybe at least give him a few words because he's never tried to comfort anyone in his life and so doesn't know how well he'd be able to cheer him up—but before he could think of any words, Hinata slapped his cheeks.

"Okay!" His eyes shined and he had a thin smile, but he looked more relaxed than when he first arrived. Hinata abruptly turned to face Akashi and bowed down low at his waist, "Thank you very much!"

Akashi, a bit caught off guard by Hinata's sudden increase in volume and polite mannerism, could only mutter out a small, "Sure."

When the ginger lifted his head, the thin, almost forced smile had been replaced by a look of sheer determination, "Akashi-san! Please teach me how to play basketball!"

Now, Akashi was used to being directly addressed by high-ranking people and pompous business officials, even being a young teen, but never had he ever been subjected to such a display of pleading. The people he spoke to—mostly his father's business associates—were always sneaky with their words and very confident. He always had to be careful when dealing with them. He couldn't decide if Hinata's honest request embarrassed him or made him happy. Maybe a bit of both.

His intentions when getting Hinata to join the basketball team were really just to use him. His reflexes and physical prowess are very valuable and very beneficial to have on any sports team. He had big plans for the basketball team, and he found Hinata to be a good asset. It's only the second day and their interactions could be totalled to barely an hour, but something about the energetic ginger made Akashi's lips curl upward whenever he saw him.

It wouldn't hurt to take some time out of his days to help him, right? But he did have his piano lessons right after school. And then violin lessons right after. There was also his private tutor after that and a ton of homework to do. He also had those documents and letters from business associates to read over for his father. Speaking of, his father would surely ask what he was doing if he arrived later than usual. Saying that he was helping a teammate practice would not go well if they had to spend extra time practicing. His father did not accept anything less than perfection.

Akashi took a long time to mull over it, ignoring Aomine's jabs at the ginger. "If you get kicked off the first string, I win."

"Wha-?! Win what?! You still haven't paid me back for ruining my uniform!"

"What are you talking about? I got on the first string first, so I won that."

"You did not! That was a tie!"

Midorima tried only once to get them to stop bickering, but didn't do anything much. It didn't feel like his place to stop them. He just stood by watching them, Murasakibara's crunching noises only added to the disturbance. He looked over at Akashi, who was still deep in thought.

Akashi had a hand on his chin. Is Hinata worth getting scolded and most likely punished? Probably not. Not at the moment, at least. Hinata was clumsy and loud. He had no technique and his ball-handling skills were terrible. His innate athleticism was his only saving grace.

But… he had potential. If there was one thing that Akashi could say he was better than his father at it was finding people with potential. Hinata is not worth getting punished over, but he will be. If he's properly brought up and his skills thoroughly honed, he most definitely will be worth it. Akashi truly believed that. There was no way he was going to allow someone else to overlook Hinata's growth and sully a diamond in the making. Akashi will shape that diamond himself. He will be sure to make that diamond perfect.

He stared into Hinata's eyes. He could see his lips pressed together tightly as he waited for Akashi's reply. Akashi gave him a smile and a small nod, "I'll help you."

Hinata's face split into a wide smile. His eyes shined so bright that Akashi was tempted to hold his hands up to block the radiance, but years of holding up the dignified rich kid act at formal parties forced the temptation down. Instead he said, "But, I won't be able to help you often."

"That's okay! Just a little bit is more than enough!"

"There's no way 'a little bit' will help you. You're gonna get slaughtered," Aomine said.

Hinata pouted, "Well, what about you, Mr. O'high-and-mighty?"

"Me? I'd wreck them with my hands tied behind my back."

"Why don't you help Hinata-san then, if you're as good as you say, Aomine-san?" Midorima asked.

Aomine crossed his arms, "No way I'd help this runt!"

"And I don't want his help!"

"Sorry," Akashi cut in, "But taking time out of my schedule is tough."

"It's fine, really," Hinata grinned, "I always have free time, so you can decide when to meet up."

"If that's settled," Midorima pushed his glasses up, "Let's get changed. Practice ended ten minutes ago."

* * *

 **I'm writing everything on a whim, so whatever pops into my head gets somehow incorporated into the story. Also, I'm sorry for any inconsistencies this may cause down the line, like the Thursday thing. I'm pretty sure I had something planned for Friday, but I completely forgot what it was (Japan does not have school on Saturdays _anymore_ since, like, 2002 _)._**

 **I know that Gouenji's sister's accident happened a year before the the start of _Inazuma Eleven_ , which is their first year of junior high, but I'm making it a bit later. He's not that important to the overall story and will be leaving soon. This is still a mainly KnB and HQ crossover. You can expect some more characters from other sports (or other) anime having a brief appearance later since skill from other sports will be a major point in the story. That's what I'm going for, at least.**


	3. What it means to be an Ace

**I'm sorry for the x-over characters having bigger roles than I was hoping, but I figured they were better than OCs.**

 **I just realized the Japanese word for purple is "murasaki" and not just "mura", but I like "Murakuma" tho...**

 **Most sites say June 21 is Cancer, but Oha Asa says it's Gemini. I think...**

 **All of the training and studying techniques are completely made up and are not guaranteed to work in real life at all.**

* * *

 **Chapter 3: What it means to be an Ace**

The following days leading up to the fated practice match were tough. To make matters worse, the test was the same day as the practice match. He had a sneaking suspicion that Coach Shirogane knew that and intentionally set the date to be the same. Hinata would dread Thursdays from then on.

It wasn't all bad. He got Akashi to help him study during his lunch periods. Midorima also gave his few cents of information whenever Hinata asked. All in all, he's making good progress… hopefully….

On Akashi's suggestion after school one day, Hinata went to the third string gym instead of the larger gym where the second and first string players practiced. The odd stares he received from the third string members put him off, but when he called them out on it they just turned away. He didn't let it bother him. He joined in on their drills and forced himself into their conversations. He could tell he was making everyone uncomfortable, but he couldn't figure out why.

He did make some progress talking to the third string members, as reluctant as they were. Most of them were very negative. They didn't want to play a game where they knew they'd be beaten to the ground. He managed to convince a few players to maybe play with him. Finding some good players to help would have been great, but that wasn't likely since most if not all the third string players lost pretty much all their motivation for the sport and thus didn't bother to try very hard. It was a depressing atmosphere in the third string gym that not even Hinata's radiance could uplift.

During practice, Hinata found himself missing the dumb ganguro, as loathe as he was to admit it. The drills were nothing compared to what they went through in their trial practice the first day. It didn't look like anyone was even trying. Not in the least. The warm-up run wasn't even a run. More than half the members walked the entire five minutes. Although annoying, Aomine would've at least kept Hinata occupied enough to not notice the disheartening ambience.

The days following were filled with Akashi tutoring Hinata on basically everything. They set up times they could meet at one of the streetball courts close to the school to practice.

Akashi was a kind teacher, though maybe sometimes too brutally honest. He knew how to keep Hinata going and gave amazing suggestions. He knew exactly what was wrong and just how to fix it. Sadly, they'd only have a half-hour or so before Akashi had to leave. Hinata would stay until dark and then head home. He would have prefered to stay longer, but there weren't any streetlights and his mother would get worried. If only he could see in the dark. He'd have a lot more time to practice.

Sunday came around far too soon. The day before had been filled with scurrying around the mall with his mother, being her pack mule. No time for practice whatsoever. He did get something out of it though.

Hinata bounced his brand new basketball a few times (proudly labled as his with his name scribbled on it in black Sharpie), enjoying the satisfyingly sharp _pang_ sound each time it hit the cement. He dribbled the ball over to the hoop and stood at the endline. Akashi had to go to a basketball meeting at school, so it was just Hinata at the streetball court for a while.

Apparently, since this was the first time five first-years had been picked to join the first string right off the bat, the coaches and the principle decided to hold a meeting to get them all acquainted and plan for the future tournaments and such. Hinata's mother didn't inform him of any email like that coming in for him, so Hinata guessed he hadn't been invited. He was still on his probationary period type thing anyway. It still annoyed him though.

Hinata finished his stretches and figured he might as well start with the drills Akashi assigned him. According to Akashi, the biggest problem he had, aside from shooting, was that he couldn't run as fast as he'd like while handling the ball. Walking from endline to endline while steadily speeding up was meant to help with that. Although in truth it didn't feel like it was helping much at all.

Hinata would have prefered to start practicing shooting, but Akashi had refused to teach him. He told Hinata to focus on dribbling and ball-handling first. But, what good would that be if he couldn't score? He stopped his drill earlier than usual and faced the very tall hoop, bringing the ball to his chest. He jumped as high as he could and shot the ball away from his chest. It hit the backboard way above the hoop and rebounded back to him.

That was expected. He was trying and failing to imitate what he had seen during the trial practice. He didn't know the actualities of the skill. But still, the fact that it didn't go in even if he totally expected it wouldn't have still ticked him off. He glared at the ball in his hands like it was the only one at fault. He shook his head. The only way to get better was to keep practicing, so he shot the ball again, and again, and again. Not one time did it go into the basket.

The glare returned. Hinata's frustrations were at an all time high. The next time he shot the ball it was more like he flung it at the hoop with no other purpose than to relieve his aggravation. The ball didn't rebound back to him like those other times. Instead, it bounced off the rim and shot off to the side.

Hinata reeled in his anger. He couldn't use the ball to vent; the ball was innocent. Hinata ran after it, but a tall man who was standing in its path caught it first. Hinata took a step back from him when two other men equally as large joined the first. The one in front grinned and twirled the ball on his finger, "Looks like it's our lucky day. A free ball for us."

"T-that's my ball!" Hinata stammered. He flinched when the one on the left brought his face in close, "You don't mind us using it for a while, right? Go play in the sandbox or something."

As frightened as he was, Hinata glared up at them defiantly. Why did tall people have to be so scary? And not just that, why did they have to be punks? They looked even older than high schoolers. The longer he stared at their glinting piercings and yellow teeth, the less sure of himself he became and the more aware he was of how ridiculously small he was compared to them.

He tugged his bottom lip between his teeth, forcing it to stop trembling. The strong urge to flee clouded his thoughts each time his hectic heart beat, but there was no use heeding it as the only exit was blocked. There was no one else around, no one to witness the scene, no one for Hinata to hide behind.

He was alone.

"What, you gonna start crying for mommy?"

Hinata worried his lip until the pain was enough to drive away the worst of his fear. Calm down. Don't cry. Don't give them that satisfaction. Calm down. Be strong. Face them. Calm down. Just gotta get the ball from them and run. Easy. Simple. So they were tall. Whatever. If Hinata jumped, he was sure he could surpass them. Could he jump over them? No, but maybe if they leaned down.

When the one with the ball leaned down to get in his face, Hinata striked. He lunged for the spinning ball, pushing his legs to their maximum capacity, grabbing it as he jumped over the guy's shoulder. It would have been perfect had he stuck the landing. He had practiced jumping very high as a way to pretend he could be taller than everyone, but this was the first time he made a jump quite like that. His legs weren't used to it, so they couldn't stand the impact of the landing. He stumbled, the ball slipping out of his hands when he moved to break himself.

It bounced to the sidewalk where a passerby was walking. This very tall passerby had been eating from a bag of rice chips when his fingers fumbled a piece from the bag. It fell from his hands, and when he bent to pick it back up, it was crushed by the passing ball with a resounding _crack_. The hand that was reaching down twitched but did not move otherwise.

Hinata and the punks ran his way to get the ball that had continued to bounce away from them, but they all stopped at the sight of the stranger, who had risen up to his full 6-foot glory. There was a dark aura exuding from his frame as his long purple hair hid the undoubtedly frightening look on his face, but the punks didn't care even if he beat them in height by a couple centimeters.

"Outta the way, bastard!" One took a swing at the tall figure, but got his punch stopped by a much larger hand. Murasakibara lifted his head, the hair in his face parting just enough for them to see a single eye glinting with rage and vengeance. That along with the feeling that he was getting much larger and they themselves were shrinking under his powerful gaze made them flee with their tails between their legs.

Once they were gone, Murasakibara turned his head to look at Hinata, rage still evident in the gleam of his eyes. Hinata took a step back, loathing the fear that suddenly washed over him. What was he so scared of? They were the same age. Surely he could take him.

Another look at Murasakibara's scrunched up face got Hinata second guessing himself. He wouldn't hurt him, right? They were classmates. He would get in trouble. Right? But no one was around. No would see. Hinata was still alone. This was worse than when he was being stared down by those punks. Truly, tall people were terrifying.

Murasakibara reached out with one of this large hands, fingers looking like they were raring to tear into his skull. Hinata shut his eyes, preparing himself for the pain to come. Instead of an iron grip on his head, Hinata felt the hand pat him gently, and then it ruffled his hair. It was a slow motion, almost comforting.

Hinata peeked up at Murasakibara beyond his arm. The taller boy's face was completely neutral, all anger gone without a trace. There was no indication of whatever he was thinking. Hinata could only raise a ginger eyebrow in a silent question that Murasakibara didn't answer. And then a thought occurred to Hinata, "My ball! W-where's my ball?"

He dashed around Murasakibara and frantically whipped his head around, looking for any sign of his stray basketball. He didn't need to look for long though. The telltale _pang pang_ of the ball bouncing against the pavement met his ears. He turned his head, half expecting someone new to arrive who also wanted his ball, but he only saw the innocent basketball bounce merrily toward him all on its own.

He caught the ball, then looked in the direction it came from. No one was there. There were just a few trees and bushes on the other side of the street. Balls don't just bounce back like that by themselves. Someone must have sent it back, but why did they leave?

Hinata turned back to Murasakibara, who was digging through his empty bag of rice crackers for the little crumbs that were left. Hinata's eyes dropped to the pavement as he sucked up the courage to bow to his classmate, "Thank you!"

Murasakibara didn't pause in his hunt. Hinata lifted his head to look at him, curious as to why his gratitude had been met with silence. He watched the taller boy dig around in the bag for a few seconds before an idea came to him, "Hey, Murakuma! Practice with me!"

When he received no response, Hinata waved a hand between the boy's face and the bag, "Play with me, Murakuma!"

"Huh? Don't wanna."

"C'mon, please?"

On the other side of the street, a head of dark blue hair took a peek from behind the tree it was hiding behind. The boy watched the jumpy shorty antagonize the purple giant into practicing with him.

"Aomine-san."

Said person jumped as the hand he had against the tree broke off some bark in his surprise. He whipped around to scold the person that had snuck up on him, "Hey, you! Don't just sneak up on someone like that!"

Akashi's sharp, raspberry eyes stared back at him, "I don't think stalking is much appreciated either."

"I-I wasn't stalking! And like you're one to talk! Why are you over here, Akashi? Shouldn't you be the one helping the pipsqueak?"

Akashi looked over at the basketball court, where Hinata had somehow managed to convince Murasakibara to play with him; although, all Murasakibara was doing was swatting the ball away whenever it went within his reach. It was harmless fun. It didn't count as training or practicing. "I suppose you're right."

The redhead walked past the taller boy and onto the sidewalk. He looked over his shoulder at Aomine still behind the tree, "Why don't you join us? I'm sure your skills would be much appreciated."

Aomine scoffed, "I ain't gonna help the shrimp, if that's what you're asking. I just happened to be walking by when the ball hit me."

"I see," Akashi examined the blunet, taking in his averted gaze. He didn't know how much of it was a lie or not, but there was definitely something Aomine wasn't saying. Aomine had left the meeting earlier than Akashi had, so he must have stalled here for quite a while for Akashi to have caught up to him.

"Akashi-san!" Hinata waved at him from the streetball court. Murasakibara smacked the ball out of Hinata's hands, and Akashi took that chance to continue his conversation with Aomine, "I just thought a demonstration by a talented teammate would be beneficial for him."

Aomine huffed out an empty laugh, "Teammate? We won't be teammates for long. And if you're looking for talent, I'm sure you can show him just fine. Don't let your ego blow up for that though. I'm still better than you."

"Akashi-san! What are you standing there for?!"

"Your little minion is calling for you. Have fun," Aomine turned on his heel and walked away, still using the trees and brush to hide himself, but even so, he could still feel Akashi's eyes stabbing into his back.

* * *

Monday went by much the same as last week, except Hinata went to soccer practice that day since Akashi couldn't meet for their practice session. Coach Shirogane had already informed his soccer coach, Coach Sakai, about the current state of affairs, but thankfully his grumpy old soccer coach didn't make it public to everyone else on the team.

In fact, he didn't say anything about it, pretended like he didn't know at all. It made Hinata stay slightly on edge all throughout practice, like maybe the coach was going to make a sudden announcement and kick Hinata off the soccer team, too, though they had yet to get their placements.

His trepidation must have been more obvious than he thought because Gouenji approached him during their brief break period. The blond took a seat next to him on the freshly cut grass with his own water bottle in hand, "Something on your mind?"

"No! Nothing's wrong! I'm not worried!"

The raised eyebrow he received clearly conveyed its owner's skepticism. Hinata took a big gulp of water, pretending to be too distracted to notice his companion, but that just ended with half the liquid going down his windpipe.

When the silence prevailed even after all of Hinata's sputtering, the ginger stuttered, "Uh, hey, Gouenji, could you maybe show me how you do that cool flip kick?"

The striker stared at him a while longer before he sighed and heaved himself to his feet. He reached out a hand to Hinata just as the assistant coach blew the whistle, "We can start after practice."

Once practice was over, Gouenji instructed Hinata how to go about learning his flip kick technique. It was an incomplete technique and rather impractical at the moment, but it looked damn cool. Mostly because of the midair sideways twirls. And because that was the coolest part, Hinata wanted to learn that first.

Gouenji was hesitant. The twirling was meant to build momentum so that more force would be exerted on the ball when kicked. It was the toughest part of the move in Gouenji's opinion; took him a good few days to get it down. He wouldn't recommend starting with that part, but since Hinata was so insistent he supposed letting him try it out wouldn't hurt.

When Hinata took his running jump, Gouenji's eyes widened. Never had he seen anyone jump as high as Hinata could. It must have been at least twice the boy's own height. The readhead swung his body in the air, trying to spin himself, but he overshot and landed on all fours instead of just his feet. He shook himself off and tried again. After just a few tries, Hinata could do a successful spin and land on his feet. That guy would do great in gymnastics, Goenji thought, finally over his shock at Hinata's first jump.

Since the twirls seemed to come naturally to Hinata, Goenji told him to keep doing that while getting balls tossed to him. That part didn't go very well.

As Gouenji analyzed him, he saw that Hinata's concentration was mostly focused toward twirling. His jumps going into the spins now weren't nearly as high as that first jump. When the ball came, Hinata directed his attention to that and would end up falling to the ground trying to hit it due to the change in momentum in his body. After the tenth crash, they stopped for a break.

"Your major problem is that you can't split your concentration, and when you try to, your actions are jerky."

"Jerky? That's bad, right? How do I fix it?" Hinata said, so intent on learning how to improve that he didn't bother cleaning himself after his numerous falls.

Gouenji plucked a strand of grass out of the redhead's hair and flicked it away, unperturbed, "The easiest way would be to keep practicing, but that wouldn't fix the root of the problem. I think working on your dribbling would be the best."

Hinata slumped, "Dribbling again? That's all Akashi-san makes me do. The match is three days away! I need to learn something other than dribbling!"

"A match?"

Hinata froze, and then stammered out, "Y-yeah, uh, you know, a... practice match! The basketball club is having a practice match! Yeah!"

"The basketball club?"

"Oh! I never told you! That's why I was in a hurry last week. I was late to practice."

Gouenji hummed, "A practice match right after the aptitude test? All the other clubs are canceled that day because of it."

Hinata frantically thought of something to say, but Gouenji continued, "Maybe I'll go since there's no soccer practice."

"NO!"

Gouenji looked startled at that. Hinata pulled back, "I mean! Uh… It's not going to be a… well… It's, uh, going to be for the third string members! To let them practice!"

Gouenji's brow creased, "Just the third string?"

"Uh…"

"You're not a very good liar, Hinata. I know you've been lying since practice started."

And that was it. All the stress was finally too much for him. Hinata spilled everything. Gouenji listened to him babble, attentive and silent until Hinata was finished. Finally, when stubborn tears trickled from Hinata's eyes, Gouenji asked, "Why are you so scared?"

Hinata looked up, his tears frozen. Gouenji looked him straight in the eye and asked again, "Why are you so scared? Because you're not good enough? Because you know you'll lose?"

Those thoughts had never crossed Hinata's mind before. He knew he wasn't as good as Akashi or Aomine, but never did he think he was scared or not good enough. Was he scared? What was he scared of? Was he scared of losing? No, not really. He just didn't want to lose. He didn't want to lose because if he did… "I won't get to play…"

"You're playing on Thursday, aren't you?"

"But, if I don't win…"

"So you think you'll lose?"

The tone in which the question was asked, the challenging frown and narrowed gaze that were directed at Hinata; they shook Hinata to the core.

"If you're thinking like that, then you've already lost. You might as well not play at all."

A surge of anger shot through Hinata, but he didn't have time to act on it for Gouenji continued, "And those third string guys. They'll be playing because you asked them to. They'll be playing _for_ you. They're your teammates for this match. You're their captain and their ace. You should be more confident, otherwise they won't be confident either."

"I'm the captain and the ace..?" Hinata never thought of it that way. He wasn't really captain material, in his opinion. He didn't know if he even wanted to be captain. Akashi would be a much better fit. Ace, however, now that sounded cool, like really _really_ cool. A revered title given to the most important player on the team. Someone who could face all the opponents on their own and win. Someone who could lead the team to victory and glory. That's what an ace does!

"We've been here for a while. It would be best to continue this tomorrow."

Hinata shook his head, "The baseball club is meeting tomorrow, and then Akashi-san is training me right after."

"In that case, if you have any free time, just practice keeping your balance in the air while you spin. You'll get it eventually."

"Balance in the air? What does that mean?"

Gouenji hummed, "Or maybe you should try juggling."

"But isn't that using hands?"

"Maybe passing. Or would dribbling be best after all?" Gouenji walked ahead deep in thought.

"...hey, Gouenji…"

The blond stopped his inessential mumbling and turned back. Hinata smiled, "Thanks."

* * *

Hinata fumbled with the small baseball in his hand, throwing it back and forth between his open hand and his mitt, trying to get a feel for the strange glove. He didn't like it. Not at all. It was stuffy, big on his hand and just in general, and felt really weird. It being on his lesser hand was off-putting since he was right-handed and thus was used to catching balls mostly with his right hand. He couldn't move it correctly either. How does anyone catch anything with this covering their hand?

Hinata switched his left-handed mitt for a right-handed one and tossed the ball between his hands again. It didn't feel any better at all. Sort of worse actually. At least he could move the mitt enough to get a grip on the ball now.

Everyone else looked like they had prior experience. They were all doing their own thing, trying to impress the coach who was walking around and taking notes.

"Oh! Another southpaw! And you're tiny, too!"

Hinata looked up, noticing an older blond looking in his direction. Hinata scanned the area behind him, and when he saw no one else in the blond's direct line of view, he pointed to himself, "You mean me?"

"Well, yeah. Who else?" The blond took a seat by the chain fences next to the net Hinata was supposed to be throwing pitches at. He took a swig of his water bottle and then cocked his head to the side, "So? You gonna throw or what? Coach is coming this way."

Hinata looked over at the big-bellied coach, who was slowly making his way to Hinata's position. The ginger stared at the ball in his left hand and squeezed it a few times. It still felt really weird. He tossed it back and forth a few more times, but it still felt strange. The coach was getting closer, so Hinata gave up trying to get comfortable with the ball. He might as well try throwing it. He placed the ball in his mitt, pulled his arm back, lifted his leg, and swung with all his might.

His heart skipped a beat, and he let out a cry of shock. It wasn't because of the appalled faces the blond boy and the coach were making. No, he didn't even notice them. He was more concerned with his mitt that flew off his small hand and landed in the middle of the net. The ball that was supposed to be where the mitt was — or at least somewhere close to there — instead bounced back toward Hinata and rolled past him to where the coach was standing. The coach blinked his shock away and wrote some stuff down on his clipboard, though he still had an uncertain expression on his pudgy face.

When the blond boy watching got over his shock, he muffled a laugh that bordered on a scoff. Hinata, flustered, shot the older boy a glare, "S-shut up! I wasn't thinking!"

"How do you throw with the wrong hand without thinking?" He wasn't even trying to cover his laughs anymore. Hinata grumbled.

"Narumiya, you should get back to your own training."

The blond groaned, "Oh, c'mon, Coach. The first week is just to see how much the first years can kiss up to you. Everyone knows that. No one else really needs to come for practice."

The coach sighed, "And to think someone like you is the ace."

"Hey, practice is boring. Besides, does it really matter so long as we win?"

"Do what you want."

Narumiya grinned as the coach walked away. He got up and stretched, "Guess I'm clear to leave, then."

"But you're the ace."

Narumiya turned to Hinata and raised a brow, "Huh?"

Hinata fished out his mitt and stared at him, "You can't leave! You're the ace!"

"What does being the ace have anything to do with it?"

Hinata pulled at the stiff leather of the mitt, "Well, the ace has to be there for his teammates, right? So you can't leave."

"What, you want me to watch you fail again? Sorry, kid, but you're not worth my time."

"Geh! T-that's not—"

"My teammates are fine on their own," Narumiya said, cutting Hinata off and surprising him with his sudden serious attitude. "Their job is to support me. My job is to lead them forward. So long as I can do that, there's no need for me to practice."

Hinata said nothing. He watched the prideful ace of the baseball team stride away, wondering if that was what an ace should be like. Narumiya was cocky, but he exuded power and confidence. It didn't seem like he cared about his teammates, but he trusted them nonetheless. Or did he? Hinata frowned. That guy gave a lot of mixed signals.

The ace should be someone who can lead his team. Both Narumiya and Gouenji said something like that. Hinata nodded to himself, deciding that he'll be that kind of ace. Man, he was actually looking forward to the match now. He couldn't believe it was just yesterday that he broke down worrying about it.

* * *

The sky was starting to yellow due to the setting sun when Akashi's phone rang. The redhead picked it up, gave the person on the line a quick confirmation, and then turned back to his charge, "Hinata, that's enough for today."

The other redhead dropped to the ground, letting the ball he had been dribbling bounce away from him as he panted for dear life. He tried to calm his breathing because all the oxygen was getting to his head and making him dizzy, which was not a feeling he wanted after running for an hour straight. He laid down on the cement of the court. He couldn't care less if his clothes were dirtied or if his body was on fire, he just wanted his head to stop spinning and his lungs to not kill him. A shower sounded really nice, too.

"You shouldn't lay down like that after running so much. Walk for a while, and then do some stretches. When you get home, eat a full meal. You might feel like you're going to throw up, but you still need to eat to build muscle."

"Y-yes! Sir!" Hinata gasped through his huffing. Akashi pulled him up from the ground and handed him his pale hoodie, "Put your jacket on. It's getting dark, so the temperature will drop, which isn't good when you're sweating. Give your body time to cool down. If you cool down too quickly you'll get sick."

"Yes, sir," Hinata put on his jacket, trying to ignore the feeling of his sweat-soaked shirt sticking to his back.

"You don't need to call me that."

"Sorry, Akashi-san."

Akashi rummaged in his bag. Hinata retrieved his ball and walked back to Akashi. He didn't really look it, mostly because of his height, but Akashi was the kind of person who fit the role of a captain. Hinata wasn't sure about him being an ace, but Akashi could totally be the captain. A super awesome, cool, and very kind captain. Speaking of captains, wasn't the current basketball captain supposed to be choosing his opponents for the match? He wondered what kind of person the captain was.

Akashi handed him two notebooks, "The blue notebook has everything you need to know for all the subjects. The red one contains practice problems and a test I made personally. I expect you to finish everything and hand them to me tomorrow morning. I'll give you another test then to make sure you retained all the information. At this point you should be able to get a full score. We'll work on English more during lunch break tomorrow since that's your worst subject."

Hinata took the notebooks with a gentle grip, unbelieving that Akashi spent the time to do all this for him. He didn't even need to open the notebooks to know that a lot of time went into making them. He held them to his chest, heart fluttering, and bowed down low, "Thank you, Akashi-san!"

The redhead slung his bag over his shoulder, "It's fine. I'll see you tomorrow, Hinata."

"Wait!" Hinata hurriedly packed his bag and jogged to Akashi's position, "Let's walk home together."

Akashi paused but then nodded. Hinata's smiled and skipped ahead, turning back only to ask why Akashi hadn't followed him yet.

The walk was quiet, but Hinata didn't mind. He had a goofy smile on his face as he swung his legs with each step. Akashi walked beside him, eyes never straying from the road until Hinata addressed him, "Thanks, Akashi-san."

"Hm?"

"For everything," Hinata's cheery smile turned sincere, "I'm glad I have a friend as awesome as you."

The redhead stopped. Hinata pointed to the right path at the crossroad they stopped at, "I turn right here, I think, so I'll see you tomorrow, Akashi-san."

Hinata waved his companion goodbye, but he had only taken one step before Akashi called out to him, "Hinata."

Akashi had his eyes closed when Hinata turned back to look at him, but there was a small smile playing at his lips. Akashi opened his eyes, and instead of their usual analytical sharpness, they were blanketed with warmth when he said, "I'm glad you're feeling better."


	4. The Captain Always Leads

**Words spoken in English will be shown in bold.**

 **I'm sorry for the OCs. They should be a one time occurrence. They'll probably be mentioned later, though hopefully not.**

* * *

 **Chapter 4: The Captain Always Leads**

"What is the purpose of celebrating Emperor Showa's birthday?" This was the first thing Akashi said when Hinata walked into Class 1-1 for his lunchtime study session.

"Huh? Uh, it's… uh…" Hinata racked his brain for the answer. He was sure he saw something about Emperor Showa in the notes Akashi had given him the day before, but he couldn't remember exactly what had been written. "I-I know this. Uh… something about Golden Week…."

"What is the beginning of 'Gakumon no Susume' a reference to?"

"H-huh?"

"Where is DNA found in a cell?"

"In… the middle, right?"

"When should pythagorean's theorem be used?"

"Ah! That's triangles!"

Akashi's face grew more stern with each response. Even though some of the answers were relatively correct, they were not the answers he was looking for. He motioned for Hinata to take a seat, and then he slapped the practice test he had given Hinata the day before onto the desk. A small "50" was written in the top corner circled in red ink.

"I said you should have been able to get a full score, and you should have because I know you could have. So? What happened?"

"I… I got distracted. I don't like sitting for very long."

"This test should have taken you an hour at most. Did you even look at the material in the other notebook?"

"I did! ...after I took the test."

"And why did you not study it before taking the test?"

"Because I felt like I would be cheating if I looked at the answers right before taking it."

Akashi stared at the small ginger fidgeting in his seat, wondering how someone's innocence could have converted into that kind of stupidity. The redhead sighed, "We'll work on English for a while, and then I'll give you another test."

"Another one?"

"And I expect you to finish it within half an hour."

"Half an hour?!" Hinata shut his mouth at Akashi's glare.

Hinata spent the next 20 minutes trying to memorize the translations and conjugations of all the English words Akashi threw at him. But, half way through it, his brain couldn't take it anymore, "Wait! Stop for a minute, please! You're going way too fast. Why is **went** the past tense of **go** when all the others end in ' **ed** '? Why are there three different kinds of **there**? Why is the period just a dot? How do Americans ever see that?"

"There are other countries aside from America that use English as their primary language, Hinata-san," Midorima said as he walked into the classroom, a small plastic bag in his hand and what looked like tissue paper but was probably a pink flower behind his ear.

"Midorima-san! You don't need to call me that. Just Hinata is fine."

"No, you are older, so I must address you with respect."

"But I'm not that much older, am I?"

"Hinata," Akashi, who had been silently contemplating something, had an odd glimmer in his eyes when he addressed Hinata, "Repeat after me: **Nice to meet you**."

"Huh? Uh… **Nice-u to... meet you..?** "

" **You'd better get a perfect score on the aptitude test.** "

" **You... yo'd... yoo'd better get...** What was after that?"

" **You'd better get a perfect score on the aptitude test.** "

" **Yoo'd better get a parfect score... on the... api... apitatudo test.** "

" **Anything less than one-hundred means you've lost.** "

" **Anything less than one-hundered means yoof lost.** "

Akashi shut the small English dictionary in his hand with a smile, "Now, write everything I just said, and then translate it."

"Hah?! I-I can't remember all that."

"Then I'll say it again, but you'll need to repeat it as well."

"Mean! Akashi-san is mean!" He said that, but he's doing what he was told anyway, though he was grumbling about 'meanie Akashi' and 'English sucks' under his breath.

As soon as lunch break was over and Hinata left with a quick bow to Midorima, who had given Hinata one of the yakisoba breads he brought back from the cafeteria, Midorima turned in his seat to look at what Akashi was working on. It looked like a handmade test most likely meant for Hinata. He glanced up at Akashi, who was concentrating on fixing whatever was wrong with the blank test.

"For Hinata-san?"

Akashi hummed a confirmation, not pausing in his work.

"I didn't think you were of the charitable type."

"You would be correct."

"You're working rather hard though."

"Are you saying that's strange?" Akashi finally looked up at him, gaze curious, but any look those eyes gave held an aura daring you to challenge them.

"No. It's just… I think Hinata-san is capable enough now to get a passing score." It _was_ strange, actually. Midorima knew about the Akashi family and its ideals about perfection. Hinata seemed like the farthest from perfection one could get. Midorima could understand Akashi helping Hinata with his basketball skills; Hinata's reflexes were too good to let slip away, but he couldn't figure out why Akashi was helping Hinata study.

Akashi had corrected the test Hinata handed him that morning during morning classes, so Midorima had had a relatively clear view of it. Nearly all of the answers Akashi had marked wrong would have been accepted. As it was now, Hinata could pass the aptitude test with a decent score. It worried Midorima a little as to why Akashi was being so hard on their teammate.

"Are you wondering why I marked those answers wrong when they were correct?" Akashi smirked at him, "I accept nothing less than perfection. You should know that."

"Yes, but… don't you think you're just a little too hard on him?"

"Why wouldn't I want the best for my friend?"

Maybe he should start bringing in Hinata's lucky items. God knows the boy will need them.

* * *

Hinata had planned to go to track practice that day, but he went to the third string basketball gym upon Akashi's suggestion once again. It was the day before the match, so Hinata needed to know exactly who his teammates would be and work out strategies with them. Hinata agreed with the teammates part, but strategies? That wasn't his thing.

The third string guys were still mopey, but Hinata found the ones he talked to last time and got them to agree to help him tomorrow. Fortunately, he had four people who fully agreed and a few others who were still very hesitant.

After practice, Akashi came into the third string gym after everyone else left. He and Hinata had their little training session there since Akashi had to leave in a little while and didn't have enough time to move to the streetball court. The topic today was shooting, which Hinata was endlessly happy about, but it was mostly Akashi demonstrating ways to score without shooting. He suggested that Hinata rely on layups over shooting from the two-point or three-point lines. Although shooting does score more points, Hinata's rate of success wasn't high enough to make trying worth it. He'd have a better chance making safe shots and layups.

It was far too soon when Akashi's phone rang and he had to leave. Hinata stayed behind to ingrain the lessons into his forgetful brain. He practiced layups and made sure he had at least one way to score before attempting shots farther away. He was happy that he could make a few shots, but the majority of them still missed.

Another shot. Another miss. Hinata pouted and chased after the ball. He caught it, but strangely the sound of a basketball hitting the floor resounded in the empty gym. It was only once, but it still freaked him out.

Hinata looked around. Like he thought, no one else was in the gym. Could he have imagined the sound? He prepared to shoot the ball again, but the sounds came back. He could hear the squeaking of sneakers now, but there was still no one. Hinata tightened his grip on the basketball and took a shooting stance again. The sounds stopped, allowing him to concentrate a bit. He shot the ball, but he heard the sounds of another basketball behind him and swung his head around before he saw whether his own went into the basket or not.

A lone basketball bounced toward him. Hinata looked for someone in the direction it came from, but there was no one. His heartbeat quickened, and he gulped. He reached out to the ball slowly, afraid that it would suddenly come to life, possessed by a ghost or something. Teiko wasn't haunted, right? Hinata would have surely heard something about it if it were. That was something that would go on the news, right? But it wasn't like Hinata watched the news anyway. Maybe he should start doing that if it'll protect him from being unlawfully killed by a vengeful spirit.

"Excuse me."

Hinata trembled. That was definitely a real voice he heard. He was not imaging that, he was sure, but it came from behind him, and at this point Hinata was a second away from screaming his heart out and bolting. Maybe if he pretended he was just hearing things, the voice would go away.

"Excuse me," came the voice again, closer this time. Hinata jumped, flinging the basketball into the air. He bowed to the disembodied voice, making sure to close his eyes so that he wouldn't see any of the horribly misconfigured spectre and possibly offend it. He apologized in a frenzy of garbled words and spit and zoomed out of the gym as fast as he could, which was pretty fast.

He passed by a convenience store in a small neighborhood halfway into the city when he realized he left his bag in the gym. He stopped and considered going home without it. He didn't want to be eaten by a ghost. But, Akashi's test was also in his bag. Hinata didn't want to waste his friend's hard work, especially when Akashi took time out of his day to do it for him. Leaving the test in the same space as a ghost made him feel guilty. What if the ghost did something to it? With that in mind, Hinata ran back the way he came.

He was nearly at the school gates when he tripped over something. "Ah! My bag!"

Did he drop it or something? Did he actually grab his bag and forgot he was holding it? Or maybe the ghost threw it out of the gym. Hinata shivered. Yeah, he wasn't going back into the third string gym ever again.

He lifted his bag but found that the sash was snagged on something. It was then that Hinata realized he was sitting next to a body, face planted in the dirt and an arm wound around the bag's sash.

How did he get there? Did the ghost do it? Was he hurt? He wasn't wearing the Teiko uniform, rather a T-shirt and shorts, but he looked about the age of a student based solely on his small size from what Hinata could see of him. Hinata, still on edge, poked at the head of baby-blue hair with a stick he found nearby, "H-hey… Are you… okay?"

The body twitched. The head lifted slowly, little bits of debris falling off the skin as haunted blue eyes dragged up to find Hinata's terrified face. Pieces of skin fell off the face in crusts, revealing bright pink underneath, glistening with a clear substance that Hinata's petrified brain could not identify.

Hinata screamed bloody murder at the decaying face. He yanked his bag free and stumbled away, fleeing from the horrific sight and hoping the speed he was going at would knock the image out of his brain.

The boy he left behind sat up slowly and rubbed at the arm that had been holding onto the bag. He wiped off some of the dirt that stuck to his face, flushed from trying to catch up to the ridiculously fast ginger boy the first time. He brushed off the dirt on his arm, examining the angry red scratches from the bag's sash as he did so.

He looked over at the gate, but the small boy was long gone.

* * *

Hinata barely got any sleep that night, too worried about the ghost and whether its decaying minion had followed him to his house or not. He had locked all the doors and windows, shut all the curtains, and kept the lamp in his room on (ghosts didn't like light, right?), though he had settled with keeping his door slightly open to let light in from the hallway when his mother had checked up on him.

He had refused to touch his bag once he got home. His mother had asked what happened for him to be so freaked out, but after his strange babbled answer, she had rolled her eyes and taken his bag to wash it of its "taint" as Hinata said.

Deep into the night when Hinata had still been too terrified to sleep, Hinata's little sister, Natsu, walked into his room, shivering from a nightmare. Thinking it was an omen of some sort, Hinata had screamed at her to get away from him. Scared by her own brother and upset that he had yelled at her, Natsu's shrieks of sadness drowned out Hinata's own screaming. He gathered her into his arms and cuddled her, whispering into her ear that he hadn't meant what he said, and then his mother barged into his room and demanded he go to sleep.

So, on the morning of the aptitude test, Hinata dragged his feet into the classroom, dark rings under his eyes and dried drool on the corner of his mouth, flopped onto his desk and napped for the few minutes he had before class started.

His awakening was not unfamiliar and not any less annoying than the first time. This time, however, Hinata blindly reached toward the sound and mumbled in his half delirious state, "Murakuma, gimme."

The crunching noises didn't stop, but something flakey was dropped into his open palm. Hinata ate it without looking and regretted it the instant his tongue began tingling and his throat started to itch. He frantically dug through his bag for a water bottle, coughing up crumbs in his haste. Now fully awake and the tingling somewhat sated after three big gulps of water, he swerved on his chair to yell at Murasakibara, "What was that?! How can you eat something that spicy?!"

Murasakibara licked the spice off his fingers, "Spice wakes me up."

The teacher slammed a stack of papers onto the front desk just as the bell rang, "In your seats! I'm handing out your tests now. You have one hour to complete each section."

Hinata tensed. If you asked him yesterday, he would have said he could pass the tests with flying colors. Today, however, it was like all the knowledge he had crammed into his head during the past few days disappeared, like they had never been there. He brought up his pencil with a shaky hand. He can do it. He was prepared for this. He just had to go for it. With a painfully tight grip on his pencil, he set to work.

* * *

By the end of the day, Hinata felt like his head was swollen from all the thinking he had to do. When the final bell rung, he visibly deflated. Just a short nap, he told himself, but he couldn't even get a minute in with the endless crunching beside him. He forced a tired glare from where he lay, too exhausted to lift his head.

As he stared at Murasakibara, Hinata's thoughts strayed to basketball, and with those thoughts came enthusiasm mixed with some dread. The enthusiasm won over though. Suddenly energized at the thought of playing a match, he jumped out of his seat and over to the one in front of Murasakibara, "Murakuma! Stop eating already! Let's go to the gym!"

"Hm? Why?"

"'Why'?! My match is today!"

Murasakibara did not get up, "But only second and third string are playing. I don't wanna watch a boring game."

"I'm playing in it, you know!"

Murasakibara only hummed at that. Hinata pouted, "Just come on! I want someone to warm up with."

His answer was a stick-like chip in his face. It being so close to his face anyway, he just ate it out of Murasakibara's hand. It tasted just like ketchup. "You bring the weirdest snacks."

Another stick. Hinata raised an eyebrow, but at Murasakibara's prodding, he ate it like the last one. "What's with you and feeding me?" Hinata grumbled.

With the bag finally empty, Murasakibara got up. Hinata grinned, thinking that the taller boy finally decided to go to the gym with him, but his grin dropped when Murasakibara got behind him, hooked his hands underneath Hinata's armpits and lifted him onto his shoulders.

Hinata waved his arms around trying to steady himself, "Woah! Wha-?! We're doing this again?"

Murasakibara didn't answer him. He just grabbed their bags and walked through the door. With the new height, Hinata had to duck to make it through the door, "Hey, watch it! I can walk just fine, you know. I need to warm up anyway. You better be going to the gym. You know how important this match is. Hey, Murakuma, are you listening to me? Woah, I can touch the ceiling!"

He was distracted for just a minute. Not getting any response and with no way down without possible injury, Hinata sighed, crossed his arms, laid them on top of Murasakibara's head and dropped his chin on top of them. He ignored the stares they were getting as Murasakibara led them to the first string gym and even when they walked in. It was especially embarrassing when Aomine was there to poke fun at him.

"What are you laughing at, jerk?"

"Nothing, nothing. I just didn't know that you were so insecure about your height that you needed someone else to help you out with it."

"I'm not ins… insect… I don't need anyone's help for anything!"

"Course not. No one can help you not be an idiot."

"I'm not an idiot, idiot! You're the idiot!"

"Sorry, I meant True Idiot."

Hinata grinded his teeth, "Why you… What are you doing here anyway? You're not even playing."

"To see you lose, duh. Not like there's anything else going on today."

"Well, sorry for you, but I'm going to win!"

"You can't even make an inside shot. How are you going to win if you can't get any points?"

"I will get points! I'll get a lot! You'll see!"

"You better get changed then, or else you won't even be in the game."

Hinata did just that. He spent a few minutes conversing with his teammates, getting to know their names and working to raise their spirits.

"So who's going where?" One of his teammates, a taller boy with his red hair sticking out like a maple leaf, asked.

"What do you mean?" Hinata replied with genuine curiosity.

"Uh, you know, positions? Where do you want everyone?"

Another boy with a low fade cut jumped in, "Kaede and I are both Small Forwards, but I can play Shooting Guard if you need me to."

Hinata looked between his teammates, confusion clear on his face. The boy with a bowl cut grabbed at Hinata with fear in his eyes, "Don't tell me you haven't thought about it! You're the one who asked us to play!"

Hinata could only stutter as the boy shook him in a panic. The tallest boy among them tied his blond hair in a low ponytail and patted the bowl cut guy on the back, "Relax, wouldja? We don't need to play with positions. Just go at it!"

"That's not how you play basketball, Katsu. You need to follow the rules."

"Quit being a square, Boru. Rules are lame! Just power through it!"

"Guys, come on. Quit fighting," Feido cut in, "We need to decide already."

"We wouldn't be having this fight if our captain was competent at his job," jabbed Kaede.

Hinata tugged at the hem of his shirt, unsure of what to do. He agreed with Kaede; he really was not suited to be a captain. It's not like he wanted to be captain in the first place, but here he was with no way out. He took a deep breath to calm himself. The captain had to be confident, like Akashi, so that's what Hinata will do.

Hinata pointed at the spiky redhead, "Okay! You'll decide our positions! When the game starts, everyone just do what you know! All we need to do is score points! So let's go!"

Katsu tightened his ponytail with a grin, "Now that's what I'm talking about!"

Everyone else just looked at each other worriedly. Boru hunched over and mumbled, "This isn't going to go well at all."

He was right. The first quarter was miserable. The score: 18 - 7.

As the tallest player, Katsu was put in as the Center, but while he was great at catching rebounds, his defensive skills were sorely lacking. When he tried to play even a little defensively, he rammed down the oncoming players. If this were anything other than a practice match, he would have surely been given the red card by now.

Boru was the Shooting Guard. He could shoot from the three-point line and make it in with a decent percentage, but he took way too long to do it. He was an easy target for steals.

The only two who were doing relatively well were Feido and Kaede as the Small Forward and Power Forward respectively, but both were always too caught up in themselves to notice the other players around them, especially when they were handling the ball.

Hinata being the Point Guard allowed him to take in a lot of what was going on. That, and the fact that he barely ever got the ball. Kaede always hogged the ball while he ran up the court. Their opponents noticed that as well, so they wouldn't bother with anyone else, getting all their players to go steal the ball from Kaede. As much as Hinata yelled for a pass, Kaede ignored him. The same happened with his other teammates.

When Katsu got the ball, he would instantly break from his position and go for the goal, trampling anyone in his path. With his sight set on only the basket, he never saw anyone. Not the opponents, not even his teammates yelling or waving for a pass. Even when he made it in range, his shots never went in.

Feido, meanwhile, was too dependent on his teammates. He would follow his teammates around the court but didn't move much otherwise. At least he sent the ball to Hinata sometimes, but most times it would go to Kaede.

Halfway into the second quarter, 23 to 7, Hinata called a timeout. Just as he suspected, the second they were off the court his teammates turned on each other. Katsu whined about not getting the ball enough, Kaede yelled at him for not screening properly, Boru sulked under his personal cloud of gloom and Feido tried placating all of them.

"What's the point of this timeout anyway? We're less than 5 minutes 'till halftime," Kaede gritted out. He glared at Hinata, who was watching them with a contemplating gaze.

Hinata really did not need to hear their bickering, not after nearly getting his head blown up after the aptitude test. He just wanted to play a fun game of basketball, but he couldn't even do that if his own teammates refused to send him the ball. He jabbed his chest with his thumb, "Hey! At halftime, we're switching positions. All of us. I'm deciding this time."

"Hah?!" Kaede's face morphed into a murderous expression. Feido patted his shoulder to calm him down.

"And you!" Hinata pointed at Kaede, "Give me the ball sometimes, will you?! You act like you're playing alone, but this is a team sport! You have teammates for a reason!"

"Tch. Like giving you the ball will do anything. No wonder you're being kicked off the first string."

Feido punched Kaede's shoulder, "That's not nice, Kaede."

Thankfully, Hinata didn't hear him. Hinata turned to Katsu next, "You should pass me the ball, too. Or at least look at me."

"Sorry, Captain, but you're so short. It's kind of hard to see you with everyone else on the court." Hinata held back his retort for the sole fact that Katsu hadn't sounded a single bit condescending with his response.

The rest of the second half went by a little smoother than before, but now it seemed Kaede was ignoring Hinata on purpose. For the entire first half, not once did Hinata get a chance to shoot. Not. Once. All he'd been doing was running up and down the court yelling for a pass and not getting anything. Hinata could imagine Aomine's mocking laughter, or maybe he actually could hear it, but he couldn't find the tanned idiot in the crowd to properly yell at him.

The score was 30 to 10. A lucky shot scored by Kaede when he finally decided to look to Hinata for a pass got them three points.

"Katsu, you take Kaede's position. Feido, switch with Boru. No, actually, take Katsu's last position. Boru, you're switching with me. Kaede, you're taking over Boru's role."

Everyone stared at him. Katsu counted on his fingers as he tried to make sense of what Hinata said, "So… huh?"

Feido scratched his head, "I think… Katsu's Power Forward. I'm Center. Boru is Point Guard? Kaede is Shooting Guard now. And Hinata is Small Forward, I guess. Is that right?"

"Don't bother asking. He won't know."

"Ah, I guess not. But, he's gotta have a reason for switching us around, right?"

Hinata blinked, "Eh? I just want to hold the ball. You guys don't ever pass to me."

Kaede sighed, "You heard him. Completely hopeless."

Hinata pouted and huffed, "So what if I want the ball? You want it, too! At least I pass to you, jerk!"

"Whatever. Anything else, 'Captain'?"

Ignoring the emphasis, Hinata crossed his arms, "Nope. Like I said, play like you usually do. Just stop hogging the ball all the time. That goes for you too, Katsu."

"Yes, Captain!" He got a salute and a happy grin.

Feido jabbed Kaede in the side when Hinata turned away, "Why do you have to be so mean? He's just a first year."

"A first year who got put onto the first string and is now getting kicked off. I don't see how he got on in the first place."

"Well, you gotta admit he's pretty fast for being so short."

"The guy can barely hold onto the ball while he's running. He's fumbled several times. It's a wonder we're not getting stomped harder. Not like this game means anything anyway."

Feido hummed, "I guess not." He looked over at Hinata, who was now gushing over the cool dunk Katsu did in the first half. "But… I kind of want to see…"

"Hm? See what?"

"Ah, nothing," Feido waved him off, but he took another glance at the jumpy ginger. Kaede noticed and scoffed when he saw what the focus of his attention was, "I can't believe I agreed to play with that guy. I'm just gonna take it easy this half."

The second half started with the jump ball going to the opposing team. They quickly made it past Katsu and Boru and ran straight for the basket. The player with the ball was certainly fast, but he was on the small side. Feido blocked him from getting any further.

Katsu and Kaede were busy trying to keep the other players marked. Boru, meanwhile was cowering in the middle of everything.

"Boru! Steal the ball!" Hinata yelled. Boru didn't move.

One of the two players Kaede marked broke free. The ball was passed and a shot was made, but no point was scored. Feido got the rebound with an easy jump and dodged a few steal attempts before passing the ball to Kaede.

Kaede and Katsu took off. Everyone followed. Kaede wasn't fast enough to get to the basket to get a free shot in. His shot was blocked, and the ball was taken back into enemy hands. Their opponents quickly brought the fight to the other side of the court again, but Kaede didn't follow. He stood next to the enemy basket, panting, thinking and just watching everyone else. There wasn't a point to getting exhausted over this game.

"Come on, Kaede! I was open!" Katsu didn't wait for a response. He hurried back to the fight, leaving Kaede to his thoughts.

The same scenario took place, but Katsu couldn't cover all the players that Kaede's absence made free. The same player held the ball in front of Feido. Feido made sure that the smaller player was boxed in so that he couldn't pass to anyone. Boru was in a surprisingly good position despite not being marked and not marking anyone.

"Boru! Quit being scared! Steal the ball!" Hinata yelled at him again, and again Boru didn't move.

This time, the opposing player leaped back to make a jump shot, but luckily he didn't make it. The moment he jumped, Hinata broke free from his screen. Feido got the rebound, took just a second to look at the court, before he heard Hinata scream, "Pass!"

With Hinata halfway into enemy territory, Feido had to chuck the ball to make it to him. He overshot by a landslide, and the ball looked like it was going to go way over Hinata's head, but the orange haired boy jumped for it.

Hinata leaped, and, with the enemy team still on the other side of the court, he was free to make a shot, but he knew he couldn't. With his leap, he was going to land out of bounds, but with one hand on the ball, he could send it somewhere else. His eyes caught Kaede's, wide and unbelieving.

Kaede gulped as a shiver ran up his spine. Hinata's eyes were wide, and if Kaede didn't know better, he would've said they looked slitted like an animal's when it's found its next meal.

"Kaede!" Hinata slammed the ball towards him as he flew over the boundary tape. Without thinking, Kaede turned to the basket and shot the ball. It went in with a clean _swish_ , making the score 30 - 12.

"Did you make it? You made it! Alright!" Hinata came bounding back like he hadn't just crashed into the floor after that insane jump. One of the managers came over to ask if he had sustained any injuries, but Hinata apologized and said it was nothing.

Feido walk over to Kaede, just as shocked as his friend and both staring at the blushing ginger. "That was… a crazy jump, huh?"

Kaede didn't respond verbally, but he agreed completely in his mind. Then he remembered what Feido said during halftime and grabbed his friend, "You! Did you know he could do that?"

"N-no way. How could I have known?"

"But during halftime… you said… and that pass…." Kaede stopped shaking him.

"That pass sucked, and you know it. And during halftime, I was just thinking that he must've gotten onto the first string for a reason. I mean, the coaches definitely saw something in him, right? And we just saw that reason."

A pause.

"You bastard! So you did know!" The shaking resumed.

"I'm telling you I didn't!"

Kaede threw him to the floor and crossed his arms with his head turned away. Feido laughed at the redhead's attitude and with a sly grin said, "But, don't you want to see what else he can do?"

The score was 34 - 23 when the second string players called a timeout. None of the third string players knew why they would call a timeout, but Boru caught the second string players throwing glances at Hinata a lot.

"Hey, Boru!" Boru jumped at Hinata's loud voice. "What are you so scared for? We're not losing that badly."

Boru peeked at the second string players huddled around each other, "Uh, Hinata-san… I think…."

"What? You need to speak louder!" Hinata yelled, like he was giving Boru an example to copy. Katsu, who was standing beside Hinata, pointed at the second string players, "Hey, Captain, I think they're talking about you."

Instead of looking worried, Hinata's eyes gleamed, "You think so?"

Katsu nodded with a cheery smile, "Captain's jump is pretty amazing after all."

Hinata's smile widened. When the timeout was over, Hinata patted Boru's shoulder and told him, "You can do it, Boru. If you mess up, you have me to back you up."

He knew it was meant to help him relax, but Boru wasn't any less anxious no matter how amazing Hinata was (he wasn't all that amazing in Boru's opinion, no matter how high he could jump or how fast he was). The trash talk started before they even got into position.

"Hey, shrimpy! Quite a team you got!"

"Where'd you find this pack of losers?!"

"What a boring game. Come on! Give us a challenge!"

For a moment, Hinata was confused. Then he processed the words. He tightened his fists and crouched into a combat position with a strained grin, "We'll beat you down. Let's go, guys!"

36 - 25

36 - 27

40 - 32

44 - 35

The gap in their scores was decreasing, but the taunts continued.

"Are you really part of the first string?"

"Lame! What was coach thinking?"

"What's wrong, little bunny? Lost your hop?"

"It's no wonder you're losing!"

The taunts shifted from dissing Hinata's teammates to striking at him directly. The more they talked, the more annoyed Hinata got, but instead of retaliating, he went quiet. He didn't make any more calls or try to persuade Boru into stealing the ball. His movement slowed to the point where he might as well not have been playing anymore. Luckily it was the end of the third quarter that this happened.

"Let me take the next jump ball." No one said anything back to him. Even Kaede took a step back when Hinata walked by with an unknown aura surrounding the usually peppy ginger.

Hinata's jump for the jump ball looked even higher than the time he caught that miss pass. He knocked the ball over to Kaede, who ran forward once he got it. He was quickly surrounded, but then he felt a presence in the back of his head. For some reason, he knew exactly where it was coming from and what the person wanted, but he still turned his head to look anyway, and the sight he was met with nearly made his legs freeze.

Hinata locked onto him with a single visible eye, glaring at him with the clear message, no, _command_ , of _give it to me_. The first thought to go through Kaede's mind was to comply, and he did. He stopped so abruptly that his markers ran past him, and he passed the ball to Hinata before his mind caught up with his actions. But Hinata was off before it did.

The small boy was nothing like he was in the first half. His speed increased, he wasn't fumbling the ball anymore, and he was calm. Too calm. He was at the basket and scored a layup before anyone realized what happened.

The second string players shared an appalled look. They were just as if not more confused than Hinata's own teammates, though no one was more confused than Kaede. That was the second time he fell into Hinata's… whatever that was, and he didn't know if he could stop it from happening again.

Hinata took the jump ball again, but he kept it this time. He maneuvered past everyone easily, even his own teammates when they were in his path, and went for the goal.

"Katsu."

Said boy barely heard his captain, but he got the command. He followed Hinata as best he could up to the basket. The shorter boy took a shot from the 3-point line, no enemies in sight, but Katsu kept running. The ball hit the rim and bounced off, but Katsu was there to dunk it in.

Hinata blew past his opponents. He didn't care much about defending. The second string players were so off their game that he didn't need to. The score was 56 - 39 then. With less than a minute left in the game, the score was 62 - 60.

The player facing Hinata for the final jump ball wiped the sweat off his face. He sneered at the ginger, "Only 40 seconds left. There's no way you can win."

Hinata looked up, the withering look on his face causing the second string player to flinch just a little, but what made the taller player take a step back were the seemingly glowing golden eyes enraged at him for even standing in front of their owner. The referee tossed the ball up with a blow to his whistle. Hinata knocked the ball to Kaede, who immediately passed it to Katsu and ran up the court with him. Hinata stuck by the sidelines.

Katsu and Kaede passed between themselves, but it wasn't long before they were blocked. Katsu held the ball with his back to his blockers. He looked to Kaede, who was also busy being double teamed himself. Boru still hadn't moved from their side of the court, and Feido was handling his own blocker.

A thought crossed his mind, or rather it was more like an urge. Katsu didn't question it. He could feel his captain's presence in the back of his mind, and he was sure that was where he needed to pass to. He tossed the ball over his shoulder, up and over the screen. The move was so unexpected that it caught his blockers off guard. They didn't go for the ball that was so easily within their reach above their heads.

Hinata caught the ball easily. A blocker broke free from Katsu and went to prevent him from taking a shot, but Hinata turned away from him and ran the other way.

The second string players chased after him, hoping to steal the ball from him and make the winning shot themselves. When Hinata got to the other side of the court, he made a large U-turn and ran back the way he came. He shoved the ball into Boru's hands on his way past, fooling the second string players who were still chasing him.

Just as they realized Hinata wasn't in possession of the ball anymore, Boru had passed the ball their way. Hinata immediately slapped it at Kaede, who then passed it back to Feido.

Feido looked at the scoreboard, a drop of sweat rolling down his cheek. Less than 10 seconds left. What was Hinata thinking, running around like that? They needed to score.

He looked around the court. Seeing Katsu open he prepared to pass to him, but a strange sensation overtook him. His eyes moved from Katsu to Hinata, who was running along the sidelines and staring back at him with feral eyes. Feido had only one incomplete thought when he realized he just chucked the ball at Hinata.

Just like before, the ball sailed over everyone and was on a clear course over the endline. Just like before, Hinata jumped for it, but this time he had a blocker in the way. The small boy vaulted over his taller assailant, twirling his body to make it past. He set his arm out and hooked the ball into his spin, bringing it around with him, and then he threw it at the ground just before the 3-point line. The subsequent slam of the ball into the ground had a few spectators thinking the floor was cracked from the impact.

The ball flew up and hit the inside rim just as the buzzer for the timer went off, and in absolute silence the rattling of metal pierced the air. The final flop of the hoop was too clear; the recurring bounces of the basketball too loud.

It was only after the ball had hit the wall that Hinata was aware of his heavy breathing. It wasn't until Katsu slapped him on the back that he saw the amount of sweat dripping from his face. It wasn't until his other teammates shook him around cheering that he noticed his splitting headache. It wasn't until the entire gym erupted into a cacophony of noise that he realized how exhausted he was.

It was only when the world toppled over onto its side that he thought he was going to fall.


	5. Lying is Bad

**Usagi (** **兎) = rabbit**

 **Inu (犬) = dog**

 **Nezumi (** **鼠) = rat/mouse**

 **Chibi (ちび) = small (and pretty much everything synonymous to it). Usually applied to people or animals.**

 **Psst, I suck at naming things if you haven't noticed.**

* * *

 **Chapter 5: Lying is Bad**

Hinata awoke to the first rays of morning like usual, but his faint headache and burning eyes made him pull the blanket above his head. The next time he awoke was to small hands shaking him. He waved it off and went back to sleep. The hands came back with a vengeance. They slapped his back until he languidly turned to look at his offender.

"Nii-chan, Mom says to get ready for school." Natsu gave him another push before running out.

He flopped back onto the bed when she left. He didn't remembering going to bed last night and wondered if he should be worried about that. He didn't even remember getting home. What day was it? Whatever happened yesterday left his body really sore.

He readied himself and went down for breakfast. His mom looked up from her cooking when he sat down, "How are you feeling, Shouyou?"

Hinata murmured a soft okay, ignoring his aching limbs as best he could, and asked, "What day is it today?"

His mother looked at him with a concerned expression, "It's Friday, honey. Are you sure you're alright? I was really worried when that really tall boy brought you home yesterday. He said you fell asleep during basketball practice."

It took a minute for Hinata to process her words. He spat out his orange juice and exclaimed, "It's Friday?!"

She looked even more concerned when she said it again. Hinata racked his brain for memories of Thursday. He remembered Wednesday just fine: the freaky ghost in the third string gym and not being able to sleep that night. He was so tired right now that if he didn't know it was Friday he would have assumed it was the day after that event, which would have made it the morning of the aptitude test.

Speaking of tests…. Hinata hopped out of his chair and ran around the house looking for his bag. He dug around in it until he found the mock test Akashi had given him. It was blank. He took a moment of silence to apologize to Akashi.

Hinata trudged out the door, waving to his mom and telling her that he was well enough to go to school despite really not looking it. He probably should have skipped school just so that he wouldn't have to turn in the homework that he didn't do yesterday, but then he would have felt bad for basically lying to his teachers, and mom said lying was bad.

He let out a large yawn just before Murasakibara walked out of a connecting street, "Morning, Murakuma."

Hinata rubbed at his still aching eyes. He heard Murasakibara walk around him, and then he felt hands under his arms and knew what was happening. He let Murasakibara put him on his shoulders and laid his head on top of fresh-out-of-the-shower lavender hair.

"Thanks, Murakuma," Hinata muttered into Murasakibara's hair, taking a short nap while the taller boy carried him to school.

Hinata awoke the third time that day, this time to a tugging on his pants leg. Realizing they were in front of the school, Hinata hopped down. "Thanks a bunch. I feel way better now."

He started walking to their classroom, but Murasakibara pulled him back by the back of his shirt. Hinata reached for the offending hand but couldn't quite reach it, "Murakuma? Hey, quit dragging me. Where are we going?"

Murasakibara said nothing as he continued to drag the still struggling Hinata to the gymnasium, where a whole lot of students were lined up. Murasakibara pushed them through to their class, who were all lined up facing the stage that was set up in front. He set Hinata in front of him and said, "Stay."

Hinata had just enough time to question the odd command before the principal tapped the mic on the podium. He listened for awhile, but it was just boring motivational stuff, so he didn't really pay attention to it. Something about congratulations on making it through the test, be sure to join a club some time soon, and whatever else the student council came up to say.

Hinata hadn't known they had a morning assembly that day. Surely they must have announced it, but he couldn't remember ever hearing about it at all. Maybe it was yesterday aka the day he doesn't remember. Well, at least he didn't remember the pain that the test had surely caused him. Then again, he didn't remember the practice match either. He wondered how that went. He was sure he won. Maybe. No, he was sure. Or, maybe.

He fidgeted in his spot, too eager and curious to stand still. He really wanted to know what happened and cursed his brain for forgetting such an important match. How could he have forgotten an entire day? Could it have been the ghost?

It felt like forever for the assembly to finally end. The second the principal said they could return to their classrooms, Hinata turned to Murasakibara, "Hey, hey, Murakuma! What happened yesterday? Did I win? I won, right?"

"Hm? Oh, you mean the game," Murasakibara patted Hinata's head, "Yeah, you won. You tired yourself out running around."

"Is that what happened? So that's why my legs are sore. Doesn't explain why the rest of my body feels like it's one giant bruise though. I still can't figure out why I can't remember. Hey, Murakuma, do you believe in ghosts? Like, the invisible kind that can still touch stuff and sends its icky undead minions after you."

"Usa-chin, do you like horror movies?"

"No! Not at all! Wait, 'Usa-chin'? Who?"

"Come on, Usa-chin. We have to go to class."

"Me?! Ah, wait! Wait for me, Murakuma!"

* * *

Momoi Satsuki was packing up her bento box when her childhood friend walked into the classroom looking even more disgruntled than he had that morning. He flopped onto the desk in front of hers and grumbled something.

"Are you still thinking about yesterday?"

"There's no way that shrimp could have played like that! He's not that good!"

Momoi sighed. Ever since the game yesterday, Aomine had done nothing but talk about it whether it be raging over 'Chibi-chan' and his supposed lack of basketball skills or recounting the game and all its glory. Maybe she will join the basketball team after all, if only to meet this 'Chibi-chan' that Aomine was so obsessed with.

Aomine sipped his banana milk, "I saw one of those guys Chibi-chan played with down in the cafe. Apparently, he was promoted to second string and was talking big. Tch, like that's something to brag about for a third year. His dunks weren't that cool. Anyone can dunk. But you know what really pissed me off?"

He ignored Momoi telling him he just said a bad word and continued, "When I asked him how he knew to throw the ball above his blockers, he said, 'I just had a feeling Captain was there.' What is that supposed to mean?! Those other guys said that, too! That they just 'had a feeling' or 'it just happened'! Something's going on with Chibi-chan, and I'm going to find out what."

Momoi studied him and watched his grip on the milk carton tightened. She hummed and thought back to all those times he complained about his little nemesis. She tilted her head and with a tiny smile asked, "Could it be… that you're jealous?"

When Aomine choked on his milk, she knew she hit the mark.

"Jealous?! Of him?! No way! There's nothing to be jealous over! I'm still a gazillion times better than him!"

"But you were impressed, right?"

"Geh!" Aomine looked away and went back to sipping his milk.

"Aren't you sort of glad that he won? You get to play with him some more."

Aomine thought it over, "I guess."

Momoi shot him a knowing look.

"What's that look for?"

"Nothing," Momoi leaned back into her chair, "You should head back to your classroom soon. Class is about to start."

Aomine grumbled again, but he got up and waved goodbye, walking back to his own classroom a few rooms down.

Momoi had been Aomine's friend for a long time, so it wasn't a surprise if she could read him better than other people. And maybe sometimes read his mind. Well, maybe not that extreme, but her intuition was very good, if she could say so herself. And her intuition right now was saying that this 'Chibi-chan' was a good thing to happen to Aomine. She couldn't wait to meet him.

* * *

It was just before last period that Hinata was approached by Coach Shirogane. He asked him to go to the faculty office after classes. After class, Hinata did as he was told. "Coach?"

"Oh, Hinata. Don't worry, you're not in any trouble. I just wanted to have a quick chat."

"Uh, okay. Did you need something?"

"I didn't have the chance to talk to you after the match yesterday. But firstly, are you feeling alright? Candy?" The old man held out a small wrapped candy.

"Uh, t-thanks," Hinata answered hesitantly, taking the candy. He fiddled with the plastic between his fingers but didn't unwrap it. He still couldn't get Shirogane's personality down. He looked harmless with a kind smile, but Hinata knew better, though now he was starting to question himself again.

"Regarding yesterday, I honestly was not expecting you to win, but you surprised me."

So, he really wanted Hinata taken off the first string? Is that what this meeting was for? But he won the match, didn't he? Coach just confirmed that.

"I wasn't planning to remove you from the first string either. I never asked that you win, just that you play."

"Eh?!"

Shirogane laughed at the reaction. He got up and motioned for Hinata to follow, "I must say, your performance yesterday was astonishing. It didn't seem like you got along with your teammates, but you pulled them together rather well."

Hinata couldn't say anything. He still couldn't remember anything about yesterday, but he vaguely recalled faces of the people who said they were going to play with him.

"You made a good decision, changing their positions to that which suited them best. You have a good game sense. Who knows, maybe you'll become the captain in your third year."

"N-no, sir! I'm not fit to be a captain. If anyone should be captain, it should be Akashi-san."

"Akashi-kun, you say? Hmm, he does have that kind of air to him, doesn't he?"

Hinata nodded enthusiastically, "Yeah! Akashi-san is super cool!"

"Oh? Are you two friends?"

Hinata nodded again, "Akashi-san taught me a whole bunch about basketball. He even helped me study for the test, and we just met this year."

"Is that so? You really look up to him, don't you?"

"Of course! I know I'm not that great at basketball yet, but I want to play with him and everyone else, too."

"It's always nice to play with friends." Shirogane opened the doors to the gym, "Well, Hinata-kun, I'm proud to say that you're welcomed to rejoin practice with us. Welcome, officially, to the first string."

With the other first string members in various position behind the coach, it was like Hinata had passed some divine test and was finally allowed some great privilege. The privilege to play basketball with his new friends. It was an overwhelming feeling of accomplishment, pride, and nerves.

"Today's practice is meant to get you acquainted with your teammates. After yesterday's excitement, I'm sure you'll appreciate the rest, but if you want to practice, you are free to do so."

"Y-yes, sir! Thank you!" Hinata gave him a stiff bow. Shirogane nodded and left to talk to that scary-looking assistant coach.

Hinata spotted Akashi first. He was talking to an older boy, looked to be a third-year. Not wanting to disturb them, Hinata turned to find Murasakibara, but the upperclassman caught his eye before he could. He was waved over to join them.

"Hinata, right? I'm Nijimura Shuzo, second year. I'll be your captain from now on." He extended his hand for a handshake. Hinata took it with an awed smile, "The year's barely started, and you're already the captain? That's awesome!"

Nijimura smiled, "I could say the same to you. That move you pulled off yesterday was really cool."

"Was it? I don't remember."

Nijimura raised an eyebrow, "That twirl thing you did for the winning shot. You don't remember?"

Hinata shook his head. Nijimura looked him up and down for injuries, "Are you okay? You did pass out after the match, but I don't think exhaustion can result in memory loss. Did you hit your head when you went down?"

"I feel fine. Really sore but fine. I really want to know what happened in the match though. Will you tell me?"

Nijimura furrowed his brows, "The match? You mean you don't remember any of it?"

Hinata shook his head.

Akashi frowned, "Hinata. Can you remember anything from yesterday?"

He shook his head again, but then reconsidered, "Well, I don't know why, but I remember thinking 'I'm here' a lot, like _a lot_ a lot."

A ball hit the back of his head. Aomine's boisterous laughter could be heard from across the gym. Hinata threw the ball back at him, assuming the tanned boy had thrown it in the first place, and ran over to where he was standing besides a pink-haired girl.

Nijimura turned back to Akashi, "Do you think he's alright? I don't want to put him into games if he has a concussion."

Akashi stared at Hinata as he argued with Aomine, "It's not a concussion. He doesn't show any symptoms."

"I still want to be careful. He could use the time off to practice some more."

Over with Hinata and Aomine, the pink-haired girl pushed them apart to end their arguing. She smiled at Hinata in an overly friendly but gentle way, "I'm Momoi Satsuki, first year. I'm a manager for the basketball club. Nice to meet you."

"H-Hinata Shouyou. Nice to meet you, too."

"You must be Chibi-chan. Aomine-kun talks about you a lot."

"Hey, Satsuki, shut up."

"That's Momoi-san to you."

"Just 'cause you wanted to change how you call me doesn't mean I have to, and like hell I'll call you that," Aomine said, trying to twirl the basketball on his finger.

"Dai-chan, that's a bad word! Ah!" Realizing her mistake too late, she stomped her foot and puffed out her cheeks, glaring at Aomine for making her slip and use her childish nickname for him. Momoi turned back to Hinata, "Anyway, you were really amazing in the game yesterday from what I heard. I'm looking forward to seeing you play."

"What was it like? The game, I mean. I know I was pretty cool, but what else happened?"

Satsuki smiled at his enthusiasm, "Sorry, I wasn't at the game. Aomine-kun talks about it a lot though, especially about you."

"Shut up, Satsuki!"

"Oh?" Hinata had a sly grin on his face as he looked over to Aomine, whose eye visibly twitched. Hinata poked his side, making Aomine drop the basketball and lean away with a grimace, "How was it, 'Dai-chan'? I was totally awesome, wasn't I? So awesome that you can't stop talking about me?"

"Keep dreaming! Your teammates did most of the work. You didn't matter at all!"

"That's not nice, 'Dai-chan'." Hinata continued poking him and saying "Dai-chan" with each jab. Fed up, Aomine picked him up and presented him to Momoi, "Look what you did, Satsuki!"

Hinata, unbothered by the sudden elevation, continued his endless taunts with a pouty face. Momoi tilted her head innocently, "Eh? But I thought you liked your nickname?"

"I hate both of you!"

"You two!" The trio stopped at the new voice. Midorima looked at them, ball in hand and very unimpressed, "Stop fooling around. If you're at practice, you should be practicing."

Aomine dropped Hinata, who got back up without much effort and said, "But coach said today was just to get to know our teamma—"

"Practice is still practice. If you're only here to dawdle, then I won't accept you as a teammate regardless of coach's orders."

Hinata immediately stood to attention, "Yes, sir!"

"Hey, Chibi-chan," Aomine grabbed a ball, "How about a match?"

"You're on! And stop calling me that!"

Momoi clapped her hands, "Alright, boys. Quit ogling each other. Let's find a free hoop."

"Wha—? Satsuki, what the hell?"

"Honestly, where did you learn all those bad words?"

"Oog-ling? What's that?"

They only managed to find one free hoop after asking the people already there if they could join in. The second string players declined and quickly moved to an adjoining hoop, where the people visibly avoided the area around the hoop Hinata, Aomine and Midorima were at.

Hinata spotted Murasakibara practicing behind them and called out to him, "Murakuma!"

Murasakibara stopped mid shoot. He lowered the ball when he saw Hinata bounding over, "Usa-chin. What? Do you wanna play?"

"Dai-chan and I wanna play a match, so can we use your hoop?"

"Eh? But I'm using it."

"Uh, that's kind of why I asked."

Momoi joined them, "That's okay. We can make it a two-on-two. Midorima-san, is that okay with you?"

Midorima nodded with a nudge of his glasses. Hinata grinned, "Then Murakuma is with me!"

"Hey! What about my input?"

Momoi waved her hand at him, "You don't have any complaints, right, Dai-chan?"

Aomine huffed, "Just don't complain when you lose. I'll be the one to beat you. You got that, Chibi-chan?"

"No way. I'm gonna win. And when I do, you have to stop calling me that."

Momoi stood between the two. If she had a whistle, she would have blown it, but sadly she didn't, so she just put a hand up to get their attention, "Since there are still a bunch of people practicing, we'll shorten the right side to the free-throw lane. Also, Murasakibara-kun, you'll be with Midorima-kun, okay?"

Murasakibara didn't have a problem with that, but the two idiots did.

"Hah?" Aomine and Hinata both screamed and then said at the same time, "I don't want to play with this guy!"

Momoi pushed them back, "And that's exactly why I'm making you do this. Today's gonna be a team exercise, got that? You're teammates now, so act like it."

They both pouted. Midorima stood behind Murasakibara on one side, while Aomine and Hinata argued over who would take the jump ball on the other. Hinata eventually got the spot, but only because Aomine figured Hinata would lose against the much taller Murasakibara and so opted to guard Midorima since he knew having Hinata guard would be ineffective.

"Ready? Go!" Momoi tossed the ball into the air. Hinata and Murasakibara both jumped at the same time, one clearly putting in much more effort than the other. Murasakibara reached the ball first. He tucked it against his chest on his way down and swiftly ran around Hinata toward the basket. Hinata was still falling from his jump, and so could not react in time to even try to block him.

Aomine got in Murasakibara's way, but in doing so he left Midorima free. Hinata ran over, and they ended up double-teaming Murasakibara. Pushing and shoving against him, Aomine purposely put an arm in front of the smaller boy, "I can handle him myself."

Hinata pushed back, "Buzz off. He's mine."

While they were distracted, Murasakibara walked away from them both and scored a lazy shot. He didn't jump or do anything fancy. He just walked up to the hoop and took the shot while his two opponents were busy fighting each other.

Midorima got the ball and passed it to Aomine, interrupting their bickering, "Stop arguing. You're here to play."

"Sorry." Although he apologized, Hinata didn't stop glaring at Aomine. Aomine was the first to move away since he had the ball. He shot a condescending grin at Hinata, "Try not to get in my way again, Chibi-chan."

Hinata trembled in silent rage. Murasakibara, who was walking back to the middle of the court, stopped to pat Hinata's head. He petted Hinata's head in a sort of calming manner and said, "There, there. Go get the ball back now."

Annoyance dissipated the rage. "You don't need to tell me!"

Hinata ran towards the battle taking place between Aomine and Midorima. He ran past them and shouted, "Hey, Ahomine! Over here!"

Aomine only took a glance at him. Midorima did as well, which gave Aomine that one split second he needed to break away. He ran past Hinata, and when he got to the basket, Aomine jumped higher than he needed to. At the peak of his jump, he grimaced and shot the ball.

Hinata jogged over, "Pass to me! Hey! Did you hear me? I said pass! Why didn't you pass?"

"Not high enough," Aomine mumbled. He ignored Hinata and ran over to where Murasakibara was playing with the ball. He still had an irritated face, like something hadn't gone his way. He swiped at the ball. Murasakibara pulled it away. Aomine swiped at it again, "If you're not gonna play, give me the ball."

Murasakibara evaded his attempts at stealing the ball in his hands, "But I am playing."

"Then do something!"

Murasakibara passed the ball to Midorima behind him, but out of nowhere Hinata took it out of its path. He made it a few feet away, but Midorima recovered from his shock quickly and went to intercept. Hinata stopped with the ball in his hands. He looked for a way to get around Midorima, but could see none. Every time he moved, even if was a slight twitch of his arm, Midorima followed.

Aomine waved at him from under the basket, "Pass!"

Hinata ignored him. Though he knew there was no getting past Midorima, he still tried to find a way. He wasn't giving up. He wasn't going to rely on Aomine, who didn't even acknowledge him as a teammate. Aomine yelled at him again, "Idiot! You're gonna run out of time!"

Hinata looked up at him, confused. Midorima took that chance to knock the ball out his hands. He grabbed the ball and dribbled it up to the three-point line, taking a jump shot from there and making it in with ease.

"Idiot!" Aomine yelled when he walked back to the middle, "What were you doing? You should have passed! You can't hold the ball for more than five seconds, you moron!"

"Eh? That's a rule?"

"Of course that's a rule! How do you not know the basic rules of the game?!"

"Well, you wouldn't pass to me when I asked!"

"But I was still dribbling!"

"That's not what I meant!"

"Hey!" Momoi screamed at them from the sidelines. "If this were a real game, you'd both be benched!"

That seemed to get their attention. They begrudgingly ended their argument and resumed the game.

Momoi sighed. The first time she had heard Aomine talk about Hinata, she had assumed the latter was just another of Aomine's opponents that would quickly be forgotten in time or replaced by whomever Aomine fought next. The more Aomine talked about him though, the more Momoi realized that Hinata was not like those who came before him. Aomine was interested in him. She'd never heard Aomine talk or complain about someone so much before.

She had been excited to see what their interactions were like, how Aomine acted around this new player, but this was not what she had been hoping for. Their relationship was so much more destructive than she had first thought. Maybe putting them on the same team had been a bad idea after all.

"What was with that pass? Make it more like _gwah_ or _wuah_!"

"Well, what about your shoot? It was way too _bwoff_!"

Or, perhaps they were okay after all, though was that even Japanese? At least they were passing to each other now, even if they argued about it every time. The other side wasn't much better though. She looked over to the other side, the game on pause at the moment, to see Midorima scolding Murasakibara for something.

"What do you think you're doing? You're not trying nearly hard enough."

"Hm? Try? But we're just playing."

"And you think just because it's a practice match it's okay to slack off? I won't tolerate you lumbering around the court like that."

Finished with whatever he and Hinata had been arguing over, Aomine took the ball out from under his arm and called out to Murasakibara and Midorima, "Hey! We're starting again!"

Momoi watched the game progress and analyzed the players. They all looked to be playing by themselves. Murasakibara didn't really pay attention to Aomine or Midorima unless they were directly in front of him or hindering him in some way. He was mostly focused on Hinata and tossed the ball over the shorter boy's head whenever he could. Whenever he did this, Midorima was most times there to get the pass that Momoi didn't think was meant to be a pass at all, and if he wasn't there, then Aomine was. Or, Hinata would chase after the ball, but he did that regardless. Momoi was fairly certain that was why Murasakibara threw the ball in the first place.

Aomine rarely passed to Hinata. He only did it to get past his blockers when he couldn't break away. Even then, he would call for a pass back. He kept jumping oddly, too, and would always wait until he started falling to shoot. If Murasakibara bothered to try even a little bit, Momoi was sure none of Aomine's shots would have made it. Sometimes Aomine would try to get the ball higher by carrying it in one hand while he was in the air, like he was trying to make a hook shot but the position was wrong. Momoi knew that wasn't the case because she knew Aomine could do hook shots no problem.

Midorima was similar to Aomine in that it looked like he was trying to accomplish something that only he knew about. He only ever shot from the three-point line or farther, refusing to even take a step past it even for rebounds.

Hinata, meanwhile, was just running after the ball. Really, that was all Momoi could see. He was certainly fast, Momoi will give him that. He was probably just as fast as Aomine, but his ball-handling skills certainly needed work. Compared to the others, it was plain as day that Hinata was a newbie. Also, his stamina didn't seem all that great either if the amount of sweat dripping from his face was anything to go by.

He slipped up more often than not, losing the ball while dribbling and missing easy shots. Even his passes were a little off the mark. Whenever he made a mistake, however small, Aomine would always call him out on it. Although, there was something about the remarks that Momoi thought was strange. There would most times be name calling involved, but as time passed, Aomine's comments lost their bite.

After Hinata missed another shot, Aomine roared at him, doing a throwing motion, "I told you, idiot! You do it like this!"

"Shut up! I know already!"

"Then do it right!"

"It's hard, okay?! I can't make the ball _bwush_ like you!"

"Then make it _foof_!"

"How do I make it _foof_ when it only _fishuu_ s?!"

"I've been telling you! Do it like this!" Aomine made another throwing motion.

"That's different from before!"

Momoi put a hand to her head. She couldn't understand a thing they were saying to each other. She looked at them again, and felt that she was correct in her assumption. Aomine's yelling lacked the condescending tone it had when they first began.

"Mind if we join you?"

Suddenly disturbed from her thoughts, she turned to see Akashi and Nijimura walking towards her. "Captain. Akashi-san."

Nijimura smiled at the easy pace of the game, "Looks like they're having fun."

Akashi watched the struggle quietly. His eyes were fixated to Hinata, taking note of the shiny sheen of sweat on his face and his oddly sluggish movements. When Hinata stumbled the landing for one of his jumps that didn't go nearly as high as he was capable of, Akashi interrupted the game, "Hinata! Come here."

Hinata exchanged a look with Aomine, who grabbed the ball to pause the game, before walking over, "What is it, Akashi-san?"

"Sit down."

Hinata lifted an eyebrow, but Akashi repeated himself, "Sit down."

Hinata gingerly sat down where he was with his hands behind him and legs out. He couldn't help the relieved sigh that escaped his panting mouth when he finished the motion. Akashi bent down and took one of his outstretched legs into his hands. He squeezed, making Hinata flinch at the sudden biting pain in his sore muscles.

Akashi let go and frowned when Hinata visibly curled in on himself from the lingering pain. He stared Hinata in the eye and asked him slowly, "What did I tell you about taking care of yourself?"

"S-sorry, Akashi-san."

"No more practicing for you. I forbid you from running until further notice."

"But—"

"You're sweating far too much, and you're muscles haven't healed in the slightest. You didn't sleep well, did you?"

"I, uh, guess not."

Akashi sighed. He turned to Momoi, "Could you go to the nurse's office and ask for some heating pads?"

Momoi nodded and ran off after a worried and incredulous glance to Hinata. Akashi brought him over to the bench to have a proper place to sit and rest. Murasakibara brought over a towel and started to rub Hinata down, pushing down Hinata's flailing limbs when they tried to stop him. When he was done and Hinata's hair puffed into a ball of fluff, Midorima bowed apologetically, "I'm very sorry, Hinata-san. Had I known you were injured, I would not have forced you to play."

"No, no! It's not your fault! I feel fine, honestly! Besides, I wanted to play." Hinata waved his hands in front of him, begging Midorima not to bow to him because it weirded him out.

"I'll get you some bandages."

"No, really, I'm okay."

Midorima ran off anyway. Murasakibara pulled at Hinata's cheek, "It's bad to lie, Inu-chin. You should tell us when you don't feel good."

"I'm not lying," Hinata yanked himself away from Murasakibara's hand, rubbing at his now stinging cheek. Murasakibara moved his hand to pet his hair. Hinata pushed the hand away, but it came back anyway, "I was just feeling a little sore. I didn't think it was that big a deal. And what's with your nicknames for me? I'm not a dog, so quit petting me."

Murasakibara did not stop. Akashi went to tell the coach of Hinata's suspension once again, and Nijimura went to tell off some second string players.

"So, Chibi-chan wasn't feeling well?" Aomine took a sip from his water bottle, "Guess that explains why you sucked more than usual today."

"Stop calling me that! And you! Stop petting me!" Hinata slapped at Murasakibara's hand again, but it came back anyway. Aomine walked over to join them. He patted another part of Hinata's puffy hair, releasing a breath of amazement, "Fluffy."

"Quit it!"

Before Hinata could jump off the bench, Aomine pushed his water bottle into his hands. "You're still sweating. Stay hydrated or you'll pass out again."

Aomine avoided Hinata's gaze when he said that, though he was still close enough for Hinata to examine his face. Hinata looked down at the light blue sports water bottle, like it was some amazing oddity. He pouted and pushed it against Aomine's gut, the sudden movement successfully stopping his and Murasakibara's insistent petting, "I don't want your spit-covered bottle."

Aomine's eye twitched. He swiped the bottle and turned away, "Fine! Sweat to death for all I care!"

He walked away just as Momoi was coming back with a package of heating pads in her arms. She called out to him as he passed her, "Dai-chan? Where are you going?"

Aomine just grumbled something unintelligible and stomped through the doorway. Momoi continued on her way to Hinata and Murasakibara, "Did something happen?"

Murasakibara rubbed the towel over Hinata's hair, most likely fluffing it up again for further petting, "Mine-chin got rejected."

If Momoi hadn't already put the pads down, she would have dropped them.

Hinata tried to pull the towel off is his head, "He already drank from it. I didn't want to touch his spit."

Momoi was so very terribly confused and also extremely worried, but she understood once Hinata asked Murasakibara to go get him a water bottle. She internally berated herself at the horrible misunderstanding and apologized to Hinata and even Aomine profusely in her mind.

"Momoi-san?"

Momoi jumped back to attention. She apologized for getting distracted and got to work applying the heating pads to Hinata's legs. When she was finished, Hinata gave her a happy and very relaxed smile, "Thanks a bunch, Momoi-san! I feel way better already."

Momoi nodded and smiled back at him, resisting the urge to pat his head and maybe give him a bear hug for the amount of cuteness he exuded. Midorima showed up with a roll of bandages. He put the roll with the extra heating pads, and then he took off his glasses and gave them to Hinata.

Hinata looked up at him, "Why are you giving me your glasses?"

"It is your lucky item for today. I apologize again for worsening your injuries."

Hinata took the glasses, still thoroughly confused but thankful nonetheless at what he assumed to be a caring gesture, "Thanks. I think."

Murasakibara came back with his bag and pulled out an Umaibo and a bottle filled with a fluorescent red liquid. Hinata reached for the bottle with a thanks, but someone else grabbed it first.

Akashi took the juice away and handed him an unopened water bottle instead. He scolded Murasakibara for almost giving Hinata an extremely unhealthy drink and Hinata for nearly accepting said drink when he was light-headed from dehydration already.

"Momoi-san, please watch Hinata and make sure he doesn't do anything to further impede himself. When the heating pads are ready to be removed, send him home. Murasakibara, Midorima, it's our turn to clean up."

Murasakibara and Midorima went to clean up with the rest of the first years. Akashi looked around, and then asked Momoi, "Where's Aomine?"

"I think he left already."

Akashi didn't say anything to that. He hummed, and then left to join the clean up crew. After about ten minutes, by then everyone was finished cleaning and had gone to change already, Momoi took off the heating pads. She used the towel to rub down his legs, and then stopped and hummed to herself. She looked up and said, "Show me your feet."

Hinata stopped playing with Midorima's glasses, "Eh? Why?"

"Just do it."

Hinata set the glasses on his head and took off his shoes and socks. He did say he hadn't thought the pain was that bad, but looking at his angry red feet covered in blisters, he had to think otherwise. His feet had looked fine that morning. Not even all that running Akashi had made him do caused his feet to look like that. Just how intense was that game yesterday?!

Momoi gently dragged the towel over his feet. The soft teeth of the towel felt like little needles against Hinata's sensitive skin, causing him to flinch several times and his toes to curl. Momoi apologized while she worked. She took the bandage roll that Midorima had brought and wrapped his feet and parts of his legs as carefully as she could. She stood up when she was finished and asked him, "How do you feel?"

Hinata tapped his feet on the floor, testing how much weight he could apply until his pain tolerance couldn't take it anymore. Hinata nodded with a small smile, "Better than before."

"Are you okay to walk?"

Hinata bent down to pick up his shoes, "I'll be okay. The bandages are kinda annoying though."

"Don't you dare take them off."

"Of course not. Momoi-san worked hard."

Momoi nodded, "You can go change now. I'll help you to the club room."

"Thank you."

They parted ways once Momoi led Hinata to the changing room. She walked to the gate of the school and was surprised to see Aomine leaning against it. He yawned and then stood up when he noticed her, "Finally. What took you so long?"

She blinked at him, "Were you waiting here this entire time?"

"Well, duh. Your mom told me to look after you, so of course I'd wait."

"Actually, I think that was your mom telling me to make sure you don't get into trouble."

Aomine turned away with a grunt, "Whatever. Let's go already."

Momoi giggled and followed. They settled into a comfortable pace side by side. Momoi looked up at the few cherry blossoms that remained and murmured aloud, "Hinata Shouyou."

"What are you bringing him up for?"

Momoi hummed, "Don't you think he's interesting?"

"As interesting as a mouse running through a maze."

"So you do think so!"

"Are you kidding?! That stuff is beyond boring to watch! The mice are always so stupid."

"But they're really cute. Doesn't Hinata remind you of a mouse?"

"What?"

"Doesn't he? He's adorable! And the way he scurried around the court was just like a mouse."

"Sometimes I wonder about you."

"You're the one who made the analogy."

"As a joke! Though, he is really small."

"So you agree he's cute."

"Hah?! I didn't say that!"

"But did you think it?"

Aomine facepalmed, "I shouldn't have said anything."

"You didn't deny it," Momoi sing-songed. She took a breath to calm herself, and then smiled sadly when she thought back to how she left Hinata. She looked up at Aomine, who had his head turned slightly away from her, "Hey, Dai-chan, about Hinata… What was he like yesterday during the match?"

"Hm? Nothing special. His teammates scored most of the points."

"You said he was running around a lot. How much exactly?"

Aomine raised an eyebrow, "I dunno. Just a lot, especially at the end."

"He fainted right after the game, right?"

Aomine didn't bother covering his laugh, "Pft. 'He fainted.' That's funnier than saying he passed out."

"Dai-chan! It's not funny! He could have been seriously hurt." He is hurt, and more than he should be, she added silently.

"He was fine enough while we were playing. He really does suck more than I thought though."

Momoi was going to yell at him for being so uncaring, but Aomine quickly pulled ahead with a hand rubbing the back of his neck. His hunched shoulders said he regretted his words, and his lowered head said he was thinking about something more than he usually did. Momoi's words died on her tongue at the surprisingly remorseful figure of her childhood friend. She had to strain her ears to hear his next words.

"Well, he's not a bad guy, I guess."

A light, feathery feeling exploded in her chest. She ran back to his side with a goofy yet knowing smile. He looked down at her warily, "What's with that face?"

"I'm sorry for saying you were jealous."

"Huh?"

"You actually really like Hinata, don't you?"

"What are you talking about?"

"He definitely needs more practice if he's going to be playing for the first string, but if you keep teaching him, I'm sure he'll be ready in no time."

"Teaching?! Seriously, what are you talking about?"

"You can't hide from me, Dai-chan. I know exactly what you were trying to do back there."

"I wasn't trying to do anything! And why're you suddenly deciding it's okay to use my nickname again? I still haven't forgiven you for telling Chibi-chan."

"You have no creativity, Dai-chan. 'Chibi-chan' is such a boring nickname."

"Well… he's a boring guy."

"That's the lamest lie I've ever heard."

Aomine clicked his tongue, "Then, Nezumi."

"That's mean, Dai-chan."

"What do you mean?! You were calling him a mouse just a few minutes ago!"

"That doesn't mean you can go around publicly calling him a rodent."

Aomine scratched his head in frustration, "Does he really need a nickname?"

Momoi swung her arms, "Well, if you like being called 'Dai-chan' by him all the time, then fine by me."

"Sometimes I wonder if you actually hate me."

"No way," she replied with a disarming smile that seemed much more sinister than it had the right to be. "I just want a cute nickname for him because we agree he's absolutely adorable."

"Fine. Whatever. What's his first name again? Shou-something. Just call him Shou-chan."

Momoi giggled at how awkward Aomine looked when he said the new nickname. She liked it though, "Shou-chan, huh? I like it. It's super cute. Are you going to call him that, too?"

Aomine paused, like he was actually considering it, but he scratched his head again and stomped away, "No way not ever. I'm sticking with Chibi-chan. Screw creativity. He gets plenty annoyed when I call him that anyway."

As they continued their walk home, Momoi couldn't help but smile at the thought that she had been correct. She knows for certain that without a doubt those two will be amazing friends one day.

* * *

 **Story info that might answer some questions you probably don't have:**

If you haven't noticed, I'm taking this story really slow (that wasn't an update joke but could be considered one). I want to thoroughly explore the relationships that I'm creating between Hinata and the Generation of Miracles (hence the 'Friendship' genre) and not fly right through it like most other stories do. I apologize if you're only here to see Hinata be OP and/or a BAMF, but I'll try to make the important matches really entertaining to compensate.

In regards to Hinata's absurd memory lose and blistering feet, those are side effects of his Zone powers. I'm not going to explicitly say anything about them, but they should be fairly obvious. Keep in mind that they're still developing powers. The Zone puts an extreme amount of stress on the body, making the state really exhausting to maintain. I don't think everyone else achieved the Zone until they entered high school (except maybe Aomine), but a high schooler's body is way more developed than a first year middle schooler's, and even then the GoM still had trouble staying in the Zone. Taking that into consideration, of course there'd be major drawbacks to going into the Zone at Hinata's current age.

The Zone is defined as 'a player's state when they reach maximum potential' or something like that, but that'll be different for Hinata. Hinata's potential is nearly limitless in this story, which may or may not be explained later on, so Hinata's Zone will be whenever he taps into the (let's call it 'refined') potential that Akashi is working to create. Think of it like purifying water. If the water in the Zone represents potential, then the water in Hinata's Zone is murky right now. The more he learns and improves, the clearer the water gets and the more Hinata can access. I'll explain more if needed when the Zone actually starts playing a part in this story.


	6. Akashi's Day Out

**Some notes on Japanese culture that you should know for this chapter (I am not an expert nor do I live in Japan. This is just what I've picked up from anime, which may or may not apply to the real world as well):  
-Texts are extremely unpopular in Japan. They use their phones to email each other instead.  
-Small children will sometimes refer to their older peers as big sister/brother (onee/onii).  
-Yen to dollar conversion: divide the amount in yen by 100 and that's roughly how much it would cost in dollars.**

 **I'm trying to keep this as real as possible, but that kind of defeats the purpose of it being a fanfiction… This is also just what I've observed in Haikyuu (i.e. Hinata emails Kenma instead of texting him).**

 **Also, I find the fact that Akashi has a flip-phone and not a smartphone in the anime kind of annoying.**

* * *

 **Chapter 6: Akashi's Day Out**

Akashi had just finished packing his bag when Hinata walked in. The orange haired boy waved at him, "Akashi-san! Wait for me, okay? Let's walk home together."

Akashi looked up. He didn't say anything until Hinata had already taken off his t-shirt and started buttoning his uniform shirt, "Sure. I'll meet you by the gate."

The redhead recorded Hinata's training schedule onto his phone. He looked it over and frowned a bit. After that practice match, he should probably rethink some things and do some recalculations. Akashi had just flipped his phone shut when Hinata ran up to him.

"Sorry I made you wait."

"That's alright. Take your time if you need to."

"Do you know where Murakuma went? He wasn't in the club room."

"Murasakibara already left."

"Ehh?" Hinata pouted, "That stupid grizzly bear. He should've waited for me. We live close by."

Their pace was slowed to accommodate Hinata's impairment. As they walked, Hinata's rambling went from complaining about Murasakibara to envying his height. Somehow that devolved into voicing his irritations about Aomine and how he was a pompous jerk who always thought he was better than everyone else, and then that somehow progressed to Hinata lowkey complimenting him.

Akashi listened with half an ear. Sometimes the strange sounds that Hinata would use to describe something caught his attention, but that was only his analytical brain trying to make sense of something that it shouldn't even be trying to make sense of.

"Hey, hey, Akashi-san, do you know when we get our uniforms? I can't wait to start playing in games."

"They should be arriving soon. I'm not sure about any matches however."

"I hope Coach sets one up soon. I'm going to show that dumb ganguro not to look down on me!"

Akashi didn't say anything. He let Hinata spout on in his weird way about the cool things he would do to impress Aomine. Akashi liked Hinata's enthusiasm, but surely the boy knew his own limits. Although, Akashi was beginning to question if he had a good grasp on Hinata's potential himself.

They stopped at a crosswalk. Hinata pointed to the side where the walking signal was white, "My house is over that way. It's the one on the very end if you want to come visit. I'll see you tomorrow, Akashi-san."

The ginger was halfway across the street before he abruptly turned around. He ran a few steps, then he caught Akashi's glare and slowed down, reaching into his bag to avoid the redhead's gaze. He pulled out a stack of papers covered in pencil marks and a familiar notebook. He handed them to Akashi with a sheepish smile, "Sorry I didn't give this to you yesterday. I totally forgot about it, but I did it during lunch today and within the time limit, too. Well, bye."

Hinata hurried across the crosswalk, leaving Akashi to stare at his back until he was out of sight. The redhead wondered if Hinata realized tomorrow was a weekend and thus had no classes.

Akashi looked at the papers in his hand. It was the test he had given Hinata the day before the aptitude test. Looking at just the front page covered in graphite, it was clear the boy had worked hard on it. Akashi didn't know whether to be mildly irritated that Hinata had turned it in late or surprised that the other redhead had done it at all. He settled for being bemused.

He tucked the notebook and papers into his bag and made his way home. The butler at the door bowed to him when he entered, and then he said something unexpected, "Your father is waiting for you in his office, Young Master."

It was a familiar line, one that he'd heard many times before, but lately Akashi had come to expect his father home after dinner or at sundown the earliest due to some contract complications, which was unheard of with his father, so he should have known that it wouldn't last long. He had a pretty good idea what his father wanted to talk to him about, though he didn't know why it couldn't wait until dinner time. At least then they'd both be forced to share a room for basic human necessities.

He nodded to the butler, who took his bag to put in his room, and then walked to his father's study. He knocked on the door, and after getting permission, entered. His father sat at his desk in the middle of the room, wrinkles more prominent than usual and eyes as unreadable as ever.

Akashi closed the door behind him quietly, "You wanted to see me, Father?"

"You're home rather late."

"My apologies. Club activities ran for a while longer than usual."

"I see. So you've joined a club."

"Yes."

There was a pause. No doubt his father wanted more details than just a simple confirmation, but if he didn't outright demand for them, Akashi felt no need to indulge the man. As he thought, his father didn't press the matter.

"So long as it doesn't affect your studies, I will allow it. However, you do know what is expected of you, I presume?"

A member of the Akashi family must excel in all domains. Of course Akashi remembered, it having been drilled into him from birth and even more after his mother's death. That was but a repressed memory now, jailed by the necessity of victory. "Yes, Father."

"Also, your curfew is now 7:00."

As much as Akashi wanted to ask why his curfew had been cut by an hour, he held his tongue. He didn't want this conversation to be longer than it needed to be. "Yes, Father."

"You may leave."

Akashi bowed slightly and left. As he walked to his room, Akashi couldn't help but think that the confrontation had been a tad unnecessary. It had only been two weeks since school started. Akashi had everything handled. The results from the aptitude test were still yet to come, but Akashi knew he would take the number one spot not just for the first-years but for the entire school. That wasn't a prediction. It was simply a fact. Teiko's reputation did nothing to deter him.

The earlier curfew didn't matter so much either. It was clearly a ploy to get Akashi to return home right after practice, but it wasn't like Akashi had anything else to do after school. All it really did was cut into his free time that he usually used to practice basketball or go horse riding.

Akashi closed the door to his room, but he paused with a hand against the smooth wood. Now that he thought about it, the earlier curfew would interfere with Hinata's training since they usually went to the park courts to practice. He doubted his father would allow Hinata to practice on their personal court or even let him in the house, so that was out of the question. He also didn't want Hinata to meet his father, or perhaps it was more accurate to say he did not want his father to meet Hinata.

He didn't have a clear reason as to why. Perhaps it was because he knew his father would not approve of Hinata, or perhaps it was to hide the fact that he was a privileged child more so than others. He knew Hinata held him in pretty high regards. It was easy to tell in the way the ginger's eyes sparkled with admiration every time he looked at Akashi. As flattering as that was, Akashi really didn't need any more of that or else he wouldn't know how to handle Hinata's exuberance.

For now, he'd have Hinata do ball handling practices. It'd be best to get him started on that early. It would take about three days for Hinata's muscles to heal, but from the bandages on his feet when he walked into the club room, he might have to extend it to five days maybe even a week. The injuries were an unfortunate setback in Akashi's plans.

He'd have to talk to Momoi about it since he didn't have Hinata's phone number. Or maybe Akashi could go visit him. After all, his father said nothing about weekends, and Hinata _had_ given him an invitation of sorts when they had parted ways.

Akashi sat down at his desk and prepared to do homework. He pulled out the mock test that Hinata had given him and skimmed through it, cracking a small smile as he did so.

* * *

The next day, Akashi stood in front of the small house that was Hinata's. Well, it was small to him when he was so used to his own large mansion. In comparison to everything else in the neighborhood, the house looked about average.

He absently wondered if he should have notified Hinata beforehand for a meeting, but he was once again reminded that he had no way of contacting Hinata since Momoi did not have the boy's number either.

A few seconds after Akashi rang the doorbell, Hinata opened the door. Seeing Akashi, he smiled and said, "Akashi-san! What are you doing here?"

"I have a new schedule for you that would be beneficial even in your current state of incapacity. I also thought you might want to know how you did on your test."

"New schedule… in state of… Um, something important right? Well, whatever. Come in, come in!" Hinata gestured him in with a big grin. He led him past the living room where a miniature version of Hinata sat on the couch staring fixedly at some cartoon playing on the television. She snapped her head in their direction when she noticed them walking up the stairs, "Nii-chan! You said you'd watch with me!"

"It's been three hours, Natsu. Akashi-san is here for some important business."

Natsu turned her childish glare to the other redhead on the stairs. She pouted and slapped her hands on the couch cushions, "No fair! You left when the good part happened!"

Hinata scratched his cheek, "I'll watch with you later."

"But this is the last episode today!" She raised her voice, clearly becoming more distressed as the conversation went on. Hinata glanced between Natsu and Akashi, and then clapped his hands together and bowed his head to the latter, "Sorry, Akashi-san. Could we maybe stay just until the episode ends?"

"That's fine," Akashi said simply. Hinata jogged down the stairs and sat next to Natsu, who jumped into his lap and tugged at his shirt to make sure he wasn't going anywhere. Akashi settled into the single couch next to them.

There were only 10 minutes or so left in the episode. After that, Hinata led Akashi to his room, where he apologized for putting him through that and wasting his time.

Akashi hummed, "A waste of time? I suppose that would be correct."

Hinata faltered, "I'm, uh, sorry again."

"No, that's alright. In a way, I suppose those types of shows are educational for children. It's a strange approach, but rather creative and certainly captures their attention much more than the industrialized structure of today's educational system."

Hinata tilted his head with a blank look. Akashi smiled apologetically, "My apologies. I was only thinking. Let's go over your test now, shall we?"

"Ehhh? But it's Saturday," Hinata whined. He flopped onto his still unmade bed and grabbed his pillow.

Akashi pulled up the chair from Hinata's desk and took out some papers from the bag he brought with him, "That's not a reason to neglect your studies, Hinata."

Hinata groaned and rolled over. He didn't make any plans today, and since Akashi was here he supposed he didn't mind studying if that's what Akashi wanted to do. They were just going over a test, so it shouldn't take that long, right? He kind of wanted to see how he did anyway. He did work hard on it after all.

A few moments later found Hinata redoing the same test. The one he already filled out was put beside him, mocking him with the bright red 50 salient on its front.

Personally, Hinata wasn't all that upset by the score. He never got particularly good grades in elementary school. In fact, 50 was about his average. Usually a passing score on exams was at least a 40, but clearly Teiko had better standards. Still though, bumping it up to 70 was a bit much, wasn't it? And Akashi wanted him to get a perfect score. Hinata hoped he had done better on the actual exam.

"Hey, Akashi-san, why is Teiko so hard?"

"There's no talking in an actual exam, Hinata."

"But I'm bored!" Hinata stretched out his arms and rolled onto his back. The pencil rolled off the bed and clattered onto the wooden floor. "A passing score is 40, isn't it? Why did Teiko make it 70?"

"My guess is that they're taking from the States. I believe a 60 is the passing score over there, and in most other cases it's a 70."

"Oh… States has it rough."

Akashi clicked his pen, "I'm talking about America."

"Eh?"

"You didn't do the World History section, did you?"

Hinata tensed. He slowly reached over the side of the bed for his pencil and then got back to work. After an hour or two—Hinata only lasted that long because he took several breaks—of studying material that Hinata was sure was at least two grade levels above them, Hinata asked, "Do you always study like this, Akashi-san?"

Akashi didn't look up from the high school level textbook he was reading, "How I study is far different from how I teach you."

"I see…" No, he didn't see. Not really. That wasn't even what Hinata was asking really, but that was his fault for asking the wrong question. What he really wanted to know was how often and for how long Akashi studied every day to get to high school level not even a month into their first year of middle school. Another good question was, how could Akashi stand sitting in one spot for so long?

"Hey, Akashi-san, do you have anything else to do today?"

Akashi looked up for a second before resuming his work, "Not particularly."

Hinata grinned and jumped from his seat on the bed, "Let's go out, then!"

Akashi turned toward him, an eyebrow raised. Hinata put his hands on the desk, eyes sparkling, "Into the city! I've only just moved here, so I didn't get to explore much. I only know about this one cool cafe down the street that we went to when we first moved in, but you've been here for a lot longer, right? So, show me around! Come on, Akashi-san! Please?"

Akashi considered it, "I suppose that's fine."

"Alright!"

Akashi packed up his things and went downstairs while Hinata got changed. Hinata's mother and sister were just finishing setting up the table when he walked down, "Oh, Akashi-kun, are you leaving already? Why not stay for lunch?"

"Thank you for the offer. Hinata wanted to go see the city, so I think we'll be eating out."

She put a hand to her cheek and smiled, "They grow up so fast. I have something for him, so make sure he doesn't leave before I get back."

Akashi nodded as she left the room. Hinata came down the stairs a moment later in a flimsy tank top and sports shorts that were shorter than the knee-length ones they would use for basketball. He looked like he was going to the gym or out on a run rather than into the city to hang out with friends.

Hinata's mom came back into the room and frowned when he saw her son. She dragged him back up the stairs, "You are not going into the city looking like that, Shouyou."

"But it's hot today!"

Akashi watched them argue up the stairs. He jumped a little—immediately pretended he hadn't despite no one having witnessed it—when he heard a loud crash, but he assumed everything was fine when nothing else occurred. He took out his phone to email his guards that he would be going into the city for the day and to not bring a limo. He debated emailing his father as well, but decided against it.

Hinata tumbled down in a tangle of cloth. He pulled the jacket off of him and threw it back up the stairs. It landed morosely two steps up. "I don't need a jacket! It's too hot today!"

His mother threw a strapped handbag down, "At least take a bag with you to carry your stuff. You can't just walk around with everything in your pockets."

"Okay, thanks! Come on, Akashi-san, let's get out of here."

"Be back before dark!"

"Okay!" Hinata hollered before he closed the door behind them. He skipped onto the street, holding the white satchel to his side to keep it from swinging too much, "So where do you wanna go? We can stop by that cafe I mentioned if you're hungry. Or if you know some other place, that'd be cool, too."

Akashi followed him at a leisurely pace, "It is lunchtime, so how about we go eat?"

Hinata slowed his skipping to swinging by Akashi's side, "Okay. Got anywhere in mind?"

"Not really. You can choose."

Hinata hummed, "Well, I wanna go somewhere new. Are there any, like, food streets?"

"Food streets?"

"Yeah, like, whole streets lined up with food trucks and tables! Like a festival! And people dress up in costumes on the streets!"

"Festival?" Did he mean something like fireworks? But what was he talking about people dressing up? Kimonos? There were several cafes that had outdoor tables, and food trucks were everywhere in Tokyo, but people only wore kimonos for New Year's or other important events, none of which occurred in April.

"Yeah! There were a whole bunch of pretty lights, and people with paint on their faces. The buildings had TVs on them, too! And the restaurants had a bunch of leaves and vines all over the place, but they still looked super clean! What was the place called again? Mmm," Hinata put a finger on his chin. Akashi had a feeling he knew what he was talking about now. Hinata lifted his finger up when he finally remembered, "Time Square! That's in Tokyo, right? It looked like Tokyo."

Maybe he should add geography to Hinata's lessons. "And where did you see Time Square exactly?"

"I saw it in a brochure my mom was looking at before we moved here along with a bunch of other pamphlets. Oh, but those all had beaches on them, so maybe we were going to move to Okinawa?"

"I think your mother was looking at vacation brochures. Time Square is in America."

"Really?! So there aren't any cafes with plants on the walls?" Hinata froze, probably from embarrassment or more likely from disappointment. Akashi sighed quietly, telling himself that not everyone in the world was on the same intellectual level and to just be patient. He was beginning to question if he had misjudged Hinata's abilities entirely.

"There are a few places in Tokyo that are similar. I'm sure we can find an establishment to your preferences." He knew his fair share of high end restaurants, and he knew his father enjoyed one in particular that had the vine decor Hinata was talking about.

"Really?!" Hinata was quick to recover, "Lead the way!"

It was close to the end of the lunch rush when they finally made it to the restaurant. Hinata stopped to gape at every tall building they passed, which was pretty much every building. Sendai wasn't that big a city, but it was still a city, so surely Hinata had seen at least a few tall buildings while he lived there. Whether he had or hadn't, Akashi suspected that the bouncy ginger would have acted this way regardless.

The restaurant was very spacious and bustling with people. Fake grape vines wrapped around the support pillars and across the brick walls where shelves upon shelves of wine were set into the criss-crossed holders. Hinata's face glowed, "Look, Akashi-san! There are actual plants growing on the walls! That's so cool!"

Akashi simply smiled good-naturedly; although, to be honest, some of Hinata's antics were beginning to try his patience. He had to call Hinata back several times when the smaller boy walked beyond the hostess podium in his dreamlike curiosity. Akashi gave the hostess his name and asked for a private room. Unfortunately, there weren't any available, so Akashi agreed to a balcony table. It was probably for the best; Akashi's guards would be less noticeable outside than in an enclosed room.

They were led to a table on the thankfully vacant balcony. Hinata leaned over the railing, gawking at the view, "Is that the skytree?! That's totally the skytree, isn't it?! There's no way that's not the skytree!"

He pointed at the tall tower in the distance that was nearly five times the height of all the other buildings around it, "It lights up, doesn't it? Do you know when? This is a great place to see it light up!"

"Sit down, Hinata. You don't want to fall off."

Hinata sat down in the seat across from Akashi. He laid out a menu in front of him and jolted at the prices, "Woah. I can get, like, three packs of Ramune for one glass of whatever this is."

"Next page, Hinata. We're not ordering from that menu."

"We're not getting juice?"

"It's not good juice."

Hinata turned the page and jolted again, "3000 yen just for some soup? Is it, like, a lot of soup? Did I even bring that much?"

"Order whatever you'd like. I'll pay."

"Ehh? I can't do that. You've already done so much for me. I can't start taking money, too."

Akashi set down the menu, "Consider it an investment."

"Investment? What does that mean?"

Akashi smiled, "Basically, I'm expecting great things from you. I'm sure you won't disappoint me."

Hinata shivered. He nodded shakily and brought the menu up to his face, and then said in a small voice, "I'll just take whatever this is, then."

Akashi offered to pay, and yet Hinata still ordered the cheapest item on the menu. He supposed the boy was trying to be considerate, but it was also an insult to an extent. Then again, Hinata didn't know what an investment was, so Akashi chose not to think much of it.

Hinata tugged at one of the leaves on the wall next to them while they waited for their food, "These aren't real? Kind of disappointing. Ah, it came off."

Akashi pretended he didn't just see Hinata vandalize a five-star restaurant. Hinata stuck the leaf into a crevice and dug around in his bag, "Hey, Akashi-san."

Hinata pulled out a bright red flip phone, "Ta-da! My mom got me a phone. Gave it to me right before we left. It's my first phone though, so I don't know how to use it, but it can't be that hard, right? Phones have cameras in them, I'm pretty sure. Oh, but we should probably exchange emails first."

He opened it and started pressing the buttons. His smile quickly disappeared, replaced by a frown of curious confusion, "Huh? That's not the character I wanted. Not that one either. Keypad's kinda hard to use. High schoolers must practice a lot."

As vacuous as Hinata could be, Akashi found him somewhat amusing—almost endearing. His innocence made him easy to manipulate. Not in a bad way. It was one of Hinata's strengths, in Akashi's opinion. It made it easier for Akashi to train him because Hinata never questioned him. It was a plus that Hinata didn't seem to have a single malevolent bone in his body either.

Still, Akashi didn't know if he could handle Hinata's less than satisfactory intellect for an entire day. He would practice basketball with him for a while after lunch, and then he would return home before his curfew, maybe take Yukimaru out for a stroll.

When they finished their meal and walked out, Hinata stretched his arms out, "I wish they'd given us more food. It was really tasty."

The portions had been a tad small, but expensive restaurants tended to go for quality over quantity. They walked down the street until Hinata got distracted by some glimmering crystals in a display window. Right next to that store was a candy store with decorative chocolates. They went inside because Hinata thought of getting something for Murasakibara, but they ended up only looking around because of how expensive everything was. The next few stores ended in the same way.

"Is every store here ridiculously expensive? Or is that just Tokyo?" Hinata grumbled, and then he gasped and ran off before Akashi could give an answer. The redhead followed Hinata to a large square where several small food trucks were parked. A lot of the people meandering around looked to be tourists, taking pictures and milling about.

Hinata returned with two crepes in his hands and handed the strawberry one to him, "Here. Strawberry for you; orange for me. Can you believe they have orange crepes? I've never seen them before. Tokyo is amazing."

Though they had just eaten, Akashi admitted the meal hadn't been very filling. He accepted the crepe and asked curiously, "Why strawberry, if I may ask?"

Hinata licked the cream off his lips, "When we were at the candy store, you were mostly looking at the fruit flavored stuff, and also…"

He hummed, thinking of the best way to word his thoughts, and then he grinned and said, "You seem like a strawberry kind of person."

Akashi blinked, and then he smiled, bringing the crepe up to his lips, "Is that so?"

Akashi thought himself more of a raspberry person, but, taking a bite of his strawberry chocolate crepe, he figured he wouldn't mind being a strawberry person for the day.

They walked around the square and watched the people passing by. Some were walking their dogs; others were taking pictures. They watched an artist draw huge chalk drawings on the ground and a few public performances by the bands set up around the square. A frisbee flew by above them, catching Hinata's attention. Akashi held him down with a firm stare, reminding him that he was still healing. It also reminded Akashi what his original goal had been when agreeing to this outing.

Initially, all Akashi had wanted was for Hinata to do some ball handling exercises after they ate. Today had been planned for shooting practice and passing. He had also planned to reassess Hinata and maybe reconfigure the boy's training regime. He wasn't sure how he had forgotten about that. He was usually pretty single-minded when it came to these things.

He looked up when he heard Hinata gasp. The orange haired boy was looking at a billboard on one of the buildings, "That movie's out already?! Let's go see it! Where's the movie theater? There's gotta be a ton of them in Tokyo, right?"

Hinata ran off. Akashi smiled wanly. Ah right, that was why.

"Come on, Akashi-san! That sign says they're showing it in the mall over there!"

He should have called Hinata back and made him prepare for their upcoming practices matches that they would surely be getting sometime this week. He should have pushed them toward a basketball court somewhere to get Hinata into practicing. He should have done those things, but Akashi found himself unable to dim the glimmer in Hinata's bright hazel eyes.

For now, Akashi would let him do as he pleased. Practice could come later, and it wasn't like he had anything else to do today, having finished the more important work for his father the day before. He could spare a few more hours for Hinata. Besides, he'd never gone to a theater to see a movie before.

The mall that the theater was in was large and luxurious. Small stores lined the walls, leaving a large opening in the middle that let the people look down at the lower floors and the decorative art structures that were hanging from the ceiling.

While Hinata ran around putting his face against the display windows, Akashi examined the stores from a comfortable distance. He was impressed by the variety and the disorganized way the stores were lined up in. How did the people here know where to go? It'd be much more effective to find a single shop that specialized in what one was looking for than to mindlessly wander an enormous building hoping that it held the same item.

"Akashi-san! Look at these stuffed animals! They're moving!"

And they wouldn't be as easily distracted either. Akashi followed Hinata into the toy store. Toys didn't interest him, though he could recognize their commercial use. He moved away from the stuffed animals that Hinata was gushing over to the board games.

Many of them he'd never heard of. Actually, he didn't think he knew any of them aside from chess and shogi. Most of them were packaged in very colorful boxes with cartoons drawn on the covers. He found a colored shogi set like that and had to wonder why shogi of all things was represented by cartoon characters.

A few of the games looked rather interesting, like that one game dealing with fake money. It was an interesting take on teaching children the workings of economics. And that English word game; that was a good way to test one's vocabulary. Maybe he'd buy it for Hinata. Then again, a crossword puzzle served the same purpose.

"Find something you like?" Hinata popped his head into the aisle. Akashi put the shogi box back on the shelf, "Somewhat. You wanted to find the theater, didn't you?"

"Oh yeah. Let's go see when the movie's playing."

They got to the theater while the previews were playing. The movie itself wasn't bad, but Akashi found the story bland and, frankly, unnecessary. The conflict could have so easily been avoided, and none of the characters evolved during the entirety of the story. There hadn't been any moral to it either. In fact, the only lesson that could be contrived was a diminution of the creative and fearlessly explorative mind.

Hinata seemed to have enjoyed it though, if his animated recounting of it was anything to go by. That stopped when they passed by a brightly lit building. Hinata paused to admire the flashing lights, "Woah! An arcade! Let's take a loo… uh, actually, let's go this way."

Hinata grabbed Akashi's hand and dragged him down the street at a hurried pace. They took turns at every which way seemingly at random. They finally stopped when Hinata brought them to a sports equipment store. There, Hinata picked out a soccer ball and grinned, a devious plan no doubt forming in his head. For what reason though, Akashi didn't know, so he decided to ask, "Hinata, was there a reason for you bringing me here in the most uncouth way possible?"

Hinata checked their surroundings, trying to be subtle about it, but Hinata trying to be subtle was like a wolf trying to be a sheep. He turned to Akashi when he was satisfied and whispered, "We're being followed. I noticed back in the mall, and they were at the restaurant, too. I think it might be the yakuza."

Coming to that conclusion wasn't that big a surprise. Akashi was more surprised that Hinata had noticed them at all. The redhead pointed to the soccer ball in Hinata's hands, "I see, and what were you planning to do with that?"

"Kicking a ball at someone hurts more than throwing it."

"There's no need for that, Hinata. The people you saw are only here for our protection."

"Protection?"

"They're bodyguards."

"Bodyguards? For who?"

"Regardless, you shouldn't worry about them."

"Hmm… If you say so," Hinata complied even though there were a million questions swimming through his head. He rolled the soccer ball over in his hands, "I still need a soccer ball anyway. I'm never going to catch up to Gouenji if I don't practice. I should get a baseball, too, now that I think about it."

"You're on the baseball team as well?"

Hinata nodded and counted off on his fingers, "I plan to join all the sports clubs! Tennis, volleyball, probably not wrestling, maybe I'll try kendo or karate. Karate would be awesome. Do we have an archery club? That'd be cool, but it looks kinda boring. I mean, you just stand there and shoot the arrow. You're not moving much at all, you know? Soccer makes you run all the time. It's great! Gouenji is super strong! He's teaching me his awesome flip kick thing. You spin in the air and then kick the ball into the goal. It's so cool!"

"Oh! Isn't that Shou-chan? Shou-chan! And Akashi-san, too!"

Hinata looked up to see Momoi coming out from one of the aisles waving at him. The head of dark blue hair peeking just above the shelves meant Aomine was with her as well.

"Momoi-san, what are you doing here?"

"You can call me Satsuki, Shou-chan!"

Hinata's face turned a cherry red, "N-no, I can't do that."

Aomine slapped Hinata's back, laughing, "Look at the little pipsqueak! Embarrassed by a girl!"

"S-shut up, idiot!"

"Seriously, you gotta think up a better insult than that. It's getting kinda boring."

"Whatever!" Hinata pouted and lifted his chin. He started walking toward the exit, "Come on, Akashi. Let's go."

Akashi bowed his head slightly to Momoi and Aomine before trailing after Hinata, leaving Momoi gawking at their backs. Momoi tugged at Aomine's shirt, "Hey, Dai-chan, did Shou-chan just get Akashi-san to follow him? Or did I accidentally switch them in my mind?"

Aomine raised an eyebrow, "What are you talking about?"

"That!" Momoi pointed to the two redheads walking away from them, "Isn't it weird seeing Akashi-san behind someone?"

Aomine scratched his head, completely uninterested in the topic, "Is it? I dunno. Never really payed attention. Or cared."

"Hinata dropped the '-san', too!"

"So?"

Momoi sighed and muttered, "You're hopeless. Well, come on. Let's follow them."

"Why?"

"Why not?"

"I'm only here 'cause you dragged me here."

"And now I'm dragging you elsewhere. Let's go before we lose them. Oh, shoot. They're gone."

"I wouldn't worry about that," Aomine waved his hand dismissively, "Chibi-chan had to go return the ball he was carrying, so they're still here somewhere. Or maybe they're in line."

Momoi hummed as her eyes narrowed at him accusingly, "You say you never pay attention to anything, but you notice things about Shou-chan a lot, don't you?"

"Hah? He was holding a soccer ball, why wouldn't I notice?"

"Exactly!" Momoi shoved her finger at his face, "It was a soccer ball. You don't care about soccer at all. Usually you'd say something like, 'I think he was holding something,' or not mention anything at all, not 'Oh, he was carrying a soccer ball that was definitely from this store that he probably didn't buy yet.' You get what I mean?"

"You're over-analyzing things again. It's annoying."

"Is that something you say to your best friend?"

"It is if it's you."

"Dai-chan— Oh, Shou-chan!" Momoi latched onto Aomine's arm with far too much strength that a prepubescent middle-school girl should be allowed to have and yanked him toward the pair of redheads who had just exited the store.

Hinata jumped at the nickname, and his cheeks turned a bright pink when he saw Momoi bounding toward them. The soccer ball nearly slipped out of his hands, and although he hadn't dropped it, it was swiped out of his grasp by a small bespectacled boy. A mess of words tumbled out of the boy's mouth, probably an apology of some sort, before he dropped the ball, did something to his shoe, and kicked it as he yelled, "Go!"

The ball rocketed off down the street. It bashed into the back of a man's head, knocking him unconscious and probably giving the poor man a concussion before ricocheting up into the air and back toward the boy who had kicked it. The boy with the funny cowlick returned the ball to Hinata with a big innocent smile on his face, like he hadn't just nearly killed a fully grown man with a generally soft sports ball, "Thanks, onii-san."

Unlike the rest of his companions, who were still trying to grasp just what exactly had happened, Hinata waved the ball around excitedly as he lavished the boy with compliments and exclamations, "That was awesome! Did you see that, Akashi?! That's exactly what I planned to do! But this guy's got awesome aim! You were aiming for his head, weren't you? Man, that was awesome! You hit him dead on! How'd you do that?! Hey, hey, can you teach me? How old are you? Man, I wish I had that kind of power! Seriously, how did you do that?!"

Hinata was completely ignoring the fact that he had no idea what the situation was, why the ball had been used to incapacitate a seemingly innocent man—quite possibly even killed him—or that he was gushing over the little boy who had done said incapacitation.

The bespectacled boy's smile became strained. He shifted his blue eyes around, watching a crowd beginning to form around the unconscious man and also trying to avoid looking at the overly enthusiastic ginger animatedly waving his arms around in front of his face too close for comfort. Hinata grabbed onto the boy's shoulders, startling him, and brought his face close enough that the sparkles in his eyes became blinding, "Teach me, please, Master!"

The boy visibly froze. Finally recovered, Aomine burst out into laughter.

"Shut up, Dai-chan!" Hinata yelled.

The laughter was cut immediately. "Don't call me that."

"Why? Don't like it?"

"Shut up!"

"I said shut up first!"

Momoi waved her hand between them and then pointed to the small child, or where the small child had been, "Shou-chan, that little boy disappeared."

"What?! No way!" Hinata whined at the loss. "I hope I see him again someday."

Momoi shrugged, "You never know. Tokyo's a pretty big place."

Hinata whined again. Akashi stood off to the side pressing buttons on his phone with the other holding the soccer ball that Hinata had dropped in his excitement. He felt more than saw Hinata trying to take a glance at his phone from over his shoulder because, really, how could anyone miss a presence as conspicuous as Hinata's. Akashi flipped his phone closed and tucked it into his pocket, "Hinata, you should head home. Your mother wanted you home before dinner."

"But it's only, like, 4:00, I think. We can stay for a little longer, right?"

"In that case," Momoi said, "Why don't we play some basketball? Dai-chan, you brought a basketball, didn't you?"

"'Course I did. I'm holding it, aren't I?"

Momoi ignored him, "Hinata, how are your feet? Do they still hurt?"

"Not at a—!" Hinata stiffened at the glare Akashi was shooting at him. Despite that, Akashi turned and said, "Alright. There's still a few hours of daylight left. Let's go play basketball."

Hinata beamed, "Akashi—"

" _You_ are not allowed to run however. All you'll be doing is ball handling."

"Stingy," Hinata pouted, but it immediately dropped into a smile as he caught up to Akashi.

Trailing behind them a little, Momoi hummed thoughtfully. Aomine looked down at her, "You're thinking about something stupid again, aren't you?"

"It's not stupid, meanie Dai-chan. When I understand something you don't that doesn't make _me_ the stupid one."

Aomine's eye twitched, but before he could retort Momoi spoke again, "I never thought Akashi-san and Shou-chan would get along so well. They seem like complete opposites, you know?"

Aomine hummed and scratched the back of his head, clearly disinterested in the conversation, "Does it really matter?"

Momoi pouted, but when she thought about, he did have a point, "I guess not."

"Let's go. I gotta make up for the time I wasted being here."

If it wouldn't have hindered his playing abilities, Momoi would have kicked him in the shin.

* * *

"I'm home," Akashi announced as the double doors closed behind him.

"Welcome home, young master," greeted the maid beside the door, "Your father would like to know where you've been all day."

Akashi pondered his answer for a bit, and then he replied with a small smile playing at his lips, "Just out with some friends."

* * *

 **I planned for this to be longer (I had an arcade scene and a skytree one too), but I figured their day out would have been way too long for a casual hangout. Later chapters will probably be longer though...**

 **I was halfway into this when I thought, 'Isn't this basically a date?' But that's fine, right? They're too young to be aware of that, right? So, it's fine, right? Or does that make it worse? Anyway, whether you think of it as a date or not, that's on you.**


	7. The First Practice Match

**Thank you all for the wonderful reviews even during my absence. Honestly, I always smile like a dumbass when I read them.**

 **Apologies for future and current violations of basketball rules. I was looking up specifics and found that basketball has** _ **a lot**_ **of specific rules.**

* * *

 **Chapter 7: The First Practice Match**

Akashi wasn't the kind of person one would see actively looking for something. He was the kind of person who kept everything in order, who knew exactly where anything he needed would be, so it really was an odd sight—even for the people who barely knew him—when he walked around the gym during practice one day visibly scanning the room for something.

"Aomine."

Said blunet turned after shooting the ball he had been holding, "Yo, Akashi. What's up?"

"Have you seen Hinata?"

Aoine blinked, surprised by the question, "Not at all. Don't you two usually walk home together?"

Akashi hummed. Hinata hadn't been to practice in the past few days, and he hadn't told anyone about it as far as Akashi knew, which, granted, wasn't much since Akashi didn't like to actively pry into other people's affairs, but Hinata having skipped three practices in a row was pushing back Akashi's plans for him more than he would have liked. He knew Hinata would most likely still be practicing on his own even with his healing injuries, but Akashi would have prefered having him in his field of vision so that he could make sure Hinata was doing everything correctly.

Well, it was still early into practice. He'll probably show up later.

Speak of the devil.

Hinata, already changed into his gym clothes, cheerfully bounded over to them after making sure the gym doors had closed behind him. Aomine waved him over, "Hey, Chibi! Akashi was just asking for you. Where've you been?"

"I was at track practice the last few days," Hinata said without breaking his smile, "You didn't know?"

Aomine, having grown used to Hinata's usual burst of anger at hearing his dreaded nickname, was understandably put off by the lack of reaction, "Uh, no."

Hinata pouted just a tiny bit, "Shoulda known that dumb kuma wouldn't say anything, but I did tell Coach. Actually, why didn't you just call me, Akashi-san? You have my number, don't you?"

The thought of calling Hinata or even shooting him an email asking for his whereabouts had never crossed his mind in all honesty. If it was for business reasons or to the servants, then Akashi wouldn't mind discussions over the phone or a quick email, but calling someone to simply ask about where they've been, the answer to which would probably be less than three sentences? Akashi had never considered it before. It seemed silly and, frankly, it was none of his business (though it kind of was since Hinata was skipping out on training).

He's also never sent an email to someone of his age group.

Instead of answering, Akashi focused on the first thing Hinata had said, "You were running?"

Hinata smiled brightly, "Yeah! The track club is surprisingly fun. Riku-senpai showed me a lot of cool tricks."

"And your feet?"

"All healed!" Hinata jumped a few times to prove his point. "I woke up Monday morning and they were feeling way better, and by the end of the day they were completely fine."

"I see." Blisters usually took a bit longer to heal, especially bigger ones like the ones Hinata had. As much as he wanted to question it, Akashi decided to just leave it as a one-time thing. That, or Hinata was a fast healer, which wouldn't surprise him.

"Forget that," Aomine interrupted, "Aren't you a little too happy right now?"

"What's wrong with being happy?" Hinata puffed his cheeks. Aomine opened his mouth to argue, but found that he really didn't have a proper counter. He grumbled instead and walked towards the basketball cart, "Whatever. C'mon, let's grab a ball and play."

"Okay!" Hinata pranced after him with springy steps. He turned around when he noticed Akashi wasn't following, "Akashi-san? Are you coming?"

Akashi looked up with a thoughtful gaze, "You go on ahead. I have some things I need to talk to Coach about."

"If you say so," said Hinata, watching the other redhead leave. Aomine yelled at him from across the gym, "Hey, Chibi! Head's up!"

The second Hinata turned his head he saw a ball flying towards his face. He only blocked the ball because of instincts, letting it bounce away as he yelled back at Aomine, "Don't go throwing random balls at my head, idiot!"

"Then pay attention, idiot!"

Hinata blew a raspberry at him and chased after the ball, checking on Akashi as he did. He watched Akashi speak to the head coach, seemingly calm as ever, but Hinata could see the tiny tells of annoyance on Akashi's stone-cold face. Granted he's never seen Akashi annoyed before, but any deviation from Akashi's usual thoughtful look or charming smile made it kind of obvious that something was bothering him.

He asked Aomine when he came back toward him, "Does Akashi look kind of annoyed to you?"

Aomine raised an eyebrow, but he squinted his eyes to try and look for any sign of annoyance on Akashi's face anyway, "He looks the same as always."

Hinata hummed at that, still staring at Akashi and failing to identity just what exactly was different enough for him to think that Akashi could have been annoyed. After a while, Hinata tilted his head and muttered, "Maybe I'm just seeing things."

"Or you're just a creep," Aomine commented as he swiped the ball from Hinata's hands. He spun it on his finger, leaning his weight onto one leg as Hinata attempted to get it back. They spent some time playing keep-away until Midorima yelled at them for not taking practice seriously. When the green-haired boy turned away from them, Aomine glanced at Hinata with a devious smirk, "Hey, Chibi-chan, wanna race?"

When he saw the interest light up in Hinata's eyes, Aomine grinned and tossed the ball from hand to hand, "Actually, I have a better idea. You win if you take this ball from me, but I win if you don't by the time I get bored."

"You're on!"

Aomine started dribbling, moving his feet one after the other and steadily gaining speed while watching Hinata, whose eyes followed Aomine's movements with frightening concentration. It was the kind of look a cat got when it's locked onto its prey, and Aomine couldn't help the tiny shiver that went up his spine as he turned away from those hungry eyes.

The second he turned to face forward however, Hinata was suddenly in front of him. Aomine froze, stock-still as his heart leaped into his throat. He managed to flick the ball skyward when Hinata dove for it, snapping out of his shock long enough to keep it out his reach and catch it with his superior height on its way down. The frantic grabs and lunges that followed gave him barely enough time to even think.

Aomine turned on his heel and ran the other way, sprinting away as fast as he could without fumbling the ball. He caught a shock of orange out of the corner of his eye and turned to find Hinata by his side. They weaved between other students who were practicing, brushing skin and dodging balls but never losing sight of each other.

They chased each other through the forest of kids, and Aomine had just a second to wonder just when it was he started chasing Hinata as much as Hinata was chasing him and how that even worked before Hinata was within attacking range again.

The kids surrounding them all parted to give the two ample room for their odd scuffle. Keeping the ball away was easy since Hinata had to jump to even attempt at taking it, but the fact that the little ginger boy could accelerate as quickly as Aomine could when the taller boy tried gaining distance was making physical contact more and more imminent. It didn't help that Hinata didn't seem to care that he nearly jabbed Aomine's stomach with his last grab at the ball.

The first out of the fray was Aomine, but he only made it a few steps before Hinata was in front of him again. Again and again this happened, and with each separation, the time between their confrontations grew shorter, and with each confrontation, Hinata's grin grew wider.

Aomine managed to get by with a fake and dived into the crowd watching them. He didn't turn back to see why people were yelling and falling over each other because he already knew why. He could feel it, a subtle knocking in the back of head that told him Hinata was getting closer. He made a sharp turn out of the crowd just as Hinata launched himself up and over their heads. Aomine would have stopped in incredulity like the others that weren't on the floor from Hinata's manhandling were he not currently focused on the game at hand.

Hinata twisted his body in the air in a way that had Aomine cringing slightly at the contortions. The small boy landed hands first, like he was some quadruped that physically could not look away from its prey, and kicked off the ground the second his feet touched the waxed floorboards. The manic grin that came flying at him gave Aomine pause, which resulted in the two of them tumbling to the floor in a painful heap.

Aomine watched the ball bounce away, all tension gone and adrenaline quickly dispersing as Hinata's elbow dug into his cheek, "Man, you are one crazy kid."

"At least get off me before you start insulting me!"

"You're the one who's on top of me!"

They started pulling at each other's faces and yanked on hair not hard enough to tear but hard enough to at least leave a sting. Even when Nijimura pried them apart they still made faces at each other. "Alright already, firsties. Cut it out."

He sighed when the two boys gave each other one last glare before they turned away each with a huff. Honestly, he was just glad they actually listened to him. He fixed his face into a stern glare, "You guys have some apologizing to do."

When the two first years didn't move from their petulant positions on the floor, Nijimura gripped each of their heads and ground his fingers into their skulls as he gritted out through his teeth, "Listen to your captain."

Satisfied with their pitiful whining at the pain he had inflicted, Nijimura dropped them to the floor again, "Now apologize."

Hinata stole a withering glance at Aomine before he mumbed, "I'm sorry."

Aomine scratched his head and made a frustrated-sounding growl before he finally bit out, "I'm sorry, too."

Nijimura nodded and crossed his arms, "That's good, and I'm glad to know that you don't actually hate each other, but I meant apologize to everyone in the gym. You two made quite the scene."

Hinata blinked and pulled his eyes away from the captain to examine the other students surrounding them, who had stopped all activity to watch them with blatant curiosity and mild annoyance. Hinata, a bit embarrassed at all the attention, bowed his head slightly, "S-sorry."

Aomine just tossed his head to the side and grunted something resembling an agreement.

Nijimura sighed, realizing that he wouldn't be getting anything more out of them. He fixed them another stern look before waving them off, "Fine, fine, get back to practice now. Next time you want to run rampant, do it on your own time."

"Yes, Captain."

Nijimura turned to everyone else and yelled, "Alright, everyone, back to practice! Midorima, watch these two idiots."

"Yes, Captain."

When Nijimura finally walked away, Aomine mumbled, "What's up with him?"

Midorima tossed him the ball he was holding, "From what I've heard, a first-string player has refused to come to practice lately. Captain Nijimura is tired of dealing with it."

Aomine turned a teasing smirk toward Hinata, "Hear that, Chibi-chan? Better watch your back if you don't wanna be kicked out too soon."

Hinata pouted, "I already told you. Coach knew what I was doing, and he told me to go right ahead and skip practice anytime if I wanted to."

"Coach said that?" Both Aomine and Midorima were surprised to hear that. Hinata nodded, "He even said I should try out more clubs, so there, dumb ganguro."

He stuck out his tongue at Aomine and was nearly smacked in the face by the ball that was thrown at him in retaliation.

Midorima pushed up his glasses, thinking over the implications of Hinata's reveal while Aomine and Hinata went back to chasing each other. In the end, he chalked it up to having to do with Hinata's eccentricities and shot the ball they had dropped in their tussle at them to separate them.

At the end of practice, the managers came in all carrying large boxes.

"Okay, everyone! Line up to get your uniforms!" One of the managers, surrounded by the boxes they had just opened, waved her arms to get everyone's attention. Momoi was next to Coach Shirogane with a box of her own. She put her hand in the air and said, "First string uniforms are over here!"

Hinata grabbed onto the closest person next to him and jumped for joy, "Uniforms! We're getting our uniforms!"

"Shut up! I heard it the first time!" Aomine struggled to pry Hinata's fingers off his arm, and after realizing that wouldn't work, attempted to push Hinata's beaming face away from him. His struggling only made Hinata latch on tighter, so when the small boy yanked on the arm, it felt almost like he was actually trying to tear it out of its socket as he babbled, "Let's go let's go let's go!"

"No need to tear my arm off!"

"Ah! Akashi! Wait for me!" Hinata bounded over to the cool-headed boy, letting go of Aomine's arm and subsequently causing the taller boy to fling himself back when the opposing force disappeared.

Hinata bounced in his place in line, practically vibrating with anticipation. Since the first string wasn't all that large, he didn't have to wait long. After handing Akashi his uniform, Momoi pulled out another sleek package, a large 13 emblazoned in blue right in the middle of the folded cloth.

Hinata reached out with reverent hands, grasping the glossy plastic with starry eyes. He turned to Akashi, starstruck for only a second before babbling, "Look, look, Akashi! Look!"

He waved the shirt around frantically, smile taking up nearly half his face. Akashi simply smiled kindly, his eyes ignoring the blurring uniform and instead focusing on Hinata's beaming face. He spoke in a tone that's main purpose was to placate small children, "I see. That's very nice, Hinata."

"Isn't it?!" Hinata lifted the package high into the air, content to simply admire it himself.

"Shou-chan," Momoi handed him another package, "You can put this one on now."

Hinata shook out the sports jacket he was given, wide-eyed with an uncontrollable grin as he admired the glossy white and blue of the jacket with the words "Teiko basketball" printed artfully on the back.

He slipped it on and tugged it so that the back was stretched out enough to see the words. He wiggled his body, ignoring Aomine's snickering in the background, and craned his head back to see the words on his back to no avail.

"First string, gather 'round!" Coach Sanada called them over. When everyone was around him, he gestured to Coach Shirogane, who cleared his throat before speaking, "There will be a practice match this weekend, and I'd like the first-years to start. Everyone else will be on standby. You'll use tomorrow to prepare for it. That is all. Oh, Hinata-kun, stay a moment, will you?"

Shirogane waited for everyone else to leave before addressing Hinata again, "How were the past few days away from practice? Good, I hope?"

Hinata nodded, "Yeah! Riku-senpai from the track team taught me a lot of cool tricks for running. I didn't know there were so many different ways you could run."

Shirogane smiled at the enthusiasm, "Good, good. About tomorrow—"

"Don't worry," Hinata interrupted, "I'll practice extra hard to make up for not being here!"

"No, no, that's alright. It's good that you want to practice, but if there's anything else you'd like to do, another club perhaps, that you'd like to go to tomorrow instead, that'd be alright as well."

Hinata looked up with wide eyes, "You mean it's okay if I skip practice even when I'm not hurt?"

"Well, it'd be good if you joined us once in a while, but if you happen to have another club you want to practice with, then simply tell me beforehand, and I'll allow it."

Hinata hummed, "There is karate club that sounds kinda cool. Tennis club is meeting tomorrow, too."

"Perhaps karate would be a nice change of pace. I'll let the karate club advisor know you're going tomorrow."

"Awesome! Thanks a bunch! But I still feel bad, like shouldn't I practice for the game?"

Coach Shirogane's smile stretched into an almost sly grin, "Not to worry. The other clubs seem to have a good influence on you."

Hinata blinked, not quite understanding what the coach meant by that. Shirogane chuckled, "Don't mind me. You should go now; I think Akashi-kun is waiting for you."

Hinata jerked his head toward the exit to find that, yes, Akashi was indeed outside by the open doors fiddling with his phone and definitely waiting for something. Hinata quickly bowed to the head coach and rattled off the customary thank yous and good day before scurrying toward the exit. He popped his head out the opening as his hands slammed against the walls, impressed by but also kind of expecting Akashi's lack of reaction to the sudden loud noise, "Akashi! Were you waiting for me?"

Akashi tucked his phone into his bag and responded in a calm and cool tone, "You don't need to rush. I simply wanted to discuss some future plans with you."

Hinata swiftly changed his shoes and eagerly jumped a couple steps out of the gym, "Sure thing! Lemme get changed real quick and we can talk on the walk back."

When he got to the club room, Midorima was just walking out. Hinata greeted him as he maneuvered around him, "Midorima-san, wait! I have your glasses!"

Hinata got changed at lightning speed and nearly dropped the glasses in his haste to put away his clothes. He returned them to Midorima with a small bow, "Thank you for lending them to me. I have to go now; Akashi is waiting for me."

Midorima watched Hinata scamper off. When the small boy was gone from sight, Midorima looked down at the glasses with a thoughtful look on his face as he brushed his fingers over the immaculate glass-like plastic. He looked back to where Hinata disappeared to and muttered to himself, "'Akashi', huh?"

Hinata found Akashi by the school gates, "Akashi! Sorry to keep you waiting."

"That's alright. Shall we be off?"

They set off on their usual route home, or what was becoming their usual. When they came up to the turn that headed toward the park, Hinata asked, "Are we practicing today?"

"Unfortunately, no. I don't have enough time today to properly instruct you."

"Mm, tomorrow then?"

"We'll see. Depends how much we get done during practice."

"I'm going to karate club tomorrow though."

"Karate?" Akashi turned his head slightly, urging Hinata for an explanation. Hinata nodded, "Yeah. Coach said I should."

"Coach said that?" Something crossed Akashi's face, making it twitch slightly into something strange before it settled into the usual impassive mask. Hinata blinked, wondering if it had just been a trick of the light, "Y-yeah. He said the other clubs were helping sorta, I think."

"I suppose they are," Akashi hummed as he brought his hand up to his chin, "In that case, we will have extra practice tomorrow. We'll meet in the park after club activities as always."

As they were coming up to a convenience store ahead, Murasakibara walked out through the sliding doors. Hinata waved at him, "Hey, Murakuma!"

Murasakibara turned towards them, eyes focused mainly on Hinata bounding up to him. The tall boy reached into the plastic bag he was holding and pulled out a long stick with a feather attached to a string hanging from its end. He dangled the feather in front of Hinata's face, brushing the boy's nose a few times and causing Hinata to sneeze and swipe at it in a futile attempt at getting Murasakibara to stop.

At some point it got into Hinata's mouth, prompting a litany of complaints and spitting, "Why do you even have that? Did you just buy it? Why's a convenience store selling cat toys anyway? That's totally weird. And stop waving it in my face!"

When Hinata successfully snatched the offending toy away, Murasakibara pulled out a cloth ball from his bag. It made a jingle sound when he shook it. "Do you wanna play with this instead, Neko-chin?"

"I'm not a cat!" Hinata grabs at the ball anyway, only for it to be pulled away from him. That started a mock resemblance to what Hinata and Aomine were doing earlier, but with Murasakibara's height and unwillingness to move, it now included Hinata hanging off the taller boy's bulky frame. It didn't seem to hinder Murasakibara in any way.

When Hinata climbed over Murasakibara's shoulder in another unsuccessful attempt at the ball, he spotted something in the bushes by the sidewalk and hollered, "Hey, Midorima-san! What are you doing over there?!"

The bushes jerked and rustled a bit before becoming silent. The top of Midorima's head appeared above the foliage, his hair just a shade lighter than the leaves he was hiding behind. He stood up and cleared his throat, trying to appear as dignified as someone could with leaves and twigs attached haphazardly to their person, "I simply wished to buy tomorrow's lucky item."

Oha-Asa didn't announce the lucky items or anything really until morning, but they didn't need to know that. Hinata smiled brightly, "Oh, that thing you always talk about, right? Do you buy something new everyday? Seems kinda like a bother though, doesn't it? Do you ever get any repeat items? You could just find things around the house, too. How do you know what's lucky or not? It is like the maneki-neko? That's always considered luck— Hey, don't start moving so suddenly, Murakuma!"

"Neko-chin is noisy."

"Hey!" Hinata slapped Murasakibara's head, but the tall boy didn't seem bothered. He said instead in his usual bored drone, "Time to go."

"At least put me down before you start walking!" Murasakibara continued walking away, carrying a struggling and protesting Hinata over his shoulder.

Midorima pulled himself out of the bushes, aware of Akashi's keen eyes on him. When he looked up, Akashi had a knowing yet mirthful smile on his face as he asked, "So what's the real reason you decided to follow us?"

Even though Midorima was expecting something along those lines, he could feel his cheeks heat up involuntarily and turned his head away to hopefully hide the emerging color. Mercifully, Akashi let the matter go, "Well, I suppose it doesn't matter."

Midorima would have graciously taken the way out, but the look that appeared in Akashi's eyes when the redhead glanced over at Murasakibara and Hinata had Midorima speaking before his mind caught up with him, "You've changed."

The icy slide of Akashi's eyes gliding to focus on him, the minuscule thinning of his already slitted pupils; there was something almost feral about him, so potent in that split second it was there that Midorima noticed Hinata from meters away tense and jerk his head their way. It caused Midorima to falter and hold his hands up in a surrendering pose almost subconsciously.

As fast as they arrived, those eyes disappeared behind Akashi's cool façade once more. It was startling when he spoke after that, "Perhaps I have."

He started walking away after that. It left Midorima speechless. He really didn't know what to think about that response.

"But what do you know?" The mocking smile returned to Akashi's face, and although that was true (what did Midorima really know about him or any of his teammates really?), Midorima couldn't help but think that this was typical of Akashi. A simple but practically seamless transition, casually redirecting the conversation to focus on something other than Akashi himself and whatever problems he might have had.

A cool-headed genius who didn't care about anyone else around him because he was far above them all; that was what Midorima thought of the lonesome redhead when he first walked into the classroom, and the practices they shared only cemented that view. Could it be that Akashi thought Midorima meant that he had become weak? That would be oddly presumptuous of Midorima, wouldn't it? It also made him wonder if Akashi thought that himself to even consider it. Did this have anything to do with Hinata's sudden lack of honorifics when addressing Akashi? Maybe Midorima was just thinking on it too much.

"Oooooi!" Hinata waved at them from the end of the street with Murasakibara munching on a bag of chips behind him, "Come on! It's gonna be dark by the time we get home!"

It honestly didn't seem like Akashi was any different from usual, and whatever was going on between him and Hinata wasn't likely to be hazardous, but Midorima really couldn't help being curious. Maybe he'd have a talk with Hinata at a later date.

* * *

When Hinata arrived to karate practice the following day, he wasn't expecting to see another school much less high schoolers practicing in the gym. He stood in the doorway, lost and nervous and jittery and wondering if he had somehow taken a wrong turn somewhere back in the hallway and had somehow ended up in an alternate universe of combat-ready high school military students eager to test their moves on unsuspecting middle school dimension hoppers.

Some of the punches they were throwing looked like they could rip someone's head off with just the wind they were bringing up. Although, now that he actually took a look around, there were some rather short people in the gym practicing as well.

"Yo!" An upperclassman walked over to him with a welcoming smile, "You must be Hinata. You picked a good day to show up; we're having some high schoolers from a powerhouse school help us train. There are robes for you in the club room out back. I'll show you there."

"T-thank you, senpai!"

After he got changed into the surprisingly comfortable and not-too-big karategi, he returned to the gymnasium right when an older student from the other school let loose a loud battle cry. She slammed her opponent into the ground hard enough for the poor kid to bounce against the plush mat. The confident stance of victory she struck looked as if she were preparing for another battle, and the succinct but clear exhale of accomplishment added to that made for a terrifying yet awe-inspiring image.

"Amazing," Hinata breathed out, and with stars in his eyes and shoulders slightly raised, he shivered with anticipation, "Teiko is amazing."

He was vaguely aware of someone beside him telling him that the girl was from a different high school and had no relation to Teiko, but he was more focused on said girl who was now walking towards him.

"Hello, I'm Mouri Ran. Are you a student here?" Her smile was every kind of disarming. It was such a drastic change from what Hinata had witnessed thus far that it had him stuttering, "Y-yes! Hinata Shouyou, first year. Nice to meet you."

"You as well, Hinata-kun. Would you like to practice with me?"

"Th-thank you very much."

With a small nod and a gentle smile, Ran led him over to the mats she had been using. She gently directed him into the proper starting position before facing him and doing the same. His muscles tensed, and he licked his lips with his eyes focused solely on the opponent now in front of him. A terrifyingly strong opponent.

He had been entirely prepared to see the fast blurs of movement, like he had gotten used to seeing from Aomine, so he was put off when Ran began moving at what seemed like a snail's pace. He tilted his head away from a punch from the left, then the right, then he hopped back from a jab aimed at his stomach. Something was off though, something other than the lack of speed.

Another punch from the left this time towards his shoulder, and then a right at the chest. Left, right, left, right. He wasn't even hopping back anymore, rather taking small steps back because the attacks always seemed to fall a little short. That was it, wasn't it?

At the opening Hinata had given lost in his own thoughts, Ran pushed her palms out and shoved him onto the floor. Immediately, the fierce concentration evaporated from her being, "Oh no! Hinata-kun, I'm sorry! Are you alright?"

"It's wrong."

Ran stepped back, "What?"

Hinata flipped himself into a sitting position and stared at her, eyes sharp and accusing, "It's wrong. This isn't what I saw at all."

"What… do you mean?" Though she said that, there was a slight ashamed look on her face that indicated she had an idea of what he was talking about, and that made Hinata's anger stir, but the fact that she was a high schooler turned it into inferiority and indignation.

"It's slow," he started, "And it's… how do I say… not… not enough? I'm not satisfied with that!"

He hoped that his eyes could convey what he was feeling better than his words. Ran, for her part, had the decency to look sheepish. She put her hands behind her back and laughed a little shy laugh, "I'm not really sure what you mean, but this is about my holding back, right? I'm sorry if I offended you. I guess you are in middle school, after all."

He would have retaliated at that last sentence were it not for the wistful tone of it, so instead he asked, "Mouri-san, do you have a younger sibling?"

She hummed, "Not… quite. He's only in first grade, but you reminded me of him just a bit, being so small, so I thought I would practice with you to save you from the other more mean kids. Guess that was unnecessary of me?"

Her smile turned bashful, and an embarrassed blush lit her cheeks.

"No."

The strength behind that one word startled her, but Hinata wasn't done. Hinata pushed himself off the ground and stood facing her with an earnest and determined expression, "I'm glad you picked me. I got to fight someone super strong even if you were holding back. I don't know what's going on with your brother, but I think the best way to protect him is to let him protect himself."

There was a bout of silence before Hinata began waving his hands frantically with a bright blush overtaking his face, "W-what I mean is… I mean, m-m-maybe t-teaching him would be… I-I dunno… I'm sorry if that was out of line, Mouri-san!"

She blinked at the abrupt change in demeanor, "Ah, no. It's fine. You… may have a point."

Hinata froze, shocked that a high schooler agreed with his way of thinking. Ran tightened her belt, "I've always gotten the feeling that I've been kind of a nuisance to him. Maybe I should give him a little more freedom. Although, Hinata-kun, perhaps you should work on your wording a bit?"

Hinata hung his head, because he had just been thinking the very same thing. Ran waved her hand, "It's not that big a deal, really. So, how about we actually get to practicing now?"

Hinata's head shot up, "Yes, ma'am!"

* * *

He showed the incomplete move he learned at karate practice to Akashi later that day. He attempted to explain how it was supposed to work, and needless to say he didn't do a good job of it, but the gist got Akashi thinking of ways to integrate the movement into something basketball related. At the moment however, it was a waste of the time he had with Hinata, and Akashi didn't have a lot of that lately.

"For now, we'll stick with training the basics. Let's play a one-on-one, and then end it for the day."

"Eh?! I'm gonna battle Akashi-san?!" A look of pure horror crossed Hinata's face.

"You play against Aomine a lot. It shouldn't be too different from that."

"But that's Ahomine." Hinata opened and closed his mouth several times, trying to figure out how best to even start explaining the ten billion differences between Aomine and Akashi.

"It'll just be a refresher for what we've practiced so far. You don't have to worry so much."

Like that's going to get Hinata to stop worrying. He couldn't just say no to Akashi though, absolutely no way, not after everything he's done for Hinata, and especially not when Akashi was waiting so patiently for him in the middle of the court like that, ball in one hand, the other on his hip with eyes gleaming in the dwindling sunlight and smile welcoming and just a tad challenging and aaaarrghhh he'll figure out how to say no to him one day. One day!

Hinata dragged his feet onto the court after a quick sip from his water bottle, his mouth suddenly dry as a desert, and willed his body to stop trembling. He took a deep breath to steady himself, and then bent his knees and tried not feeling as tense as he knew he was.

The one-on-one wasn't as brutal as he thought it was going to be, but it still made Hinata self-conscious at how badly he was performing. Actually, it might have been even worse than what Hinata had been expecting. He tripped several times and kicked the ball away while he was dribbling more times than he thought possible. And to make it worse, all Akashi did every time he messed up was tell him to calm down in an almost concerned tone. It just made Hinata feel worse.

"I'm so sorry." Hinata bowed and met the dusty concrete with his forehead, hiding the red blotch that had appeared there from a particularly bad dribbling mistake.

"It's fine, really." The words were laced with exasperation and a hint of disappointment, and Hinata didn't dare look up for fear of seeing what kind of face Akashi was making at that moment. He heard Akashi walk away, and he clenched his eyes shut at the heart-wrenching feeling of having just missed an opportunity for something he wasn't aware of.

"Hinata," Akashi called him from the bench. Hinata's heart jumped as he looked up. Akashi slung his bag over his shoulder and picked up Hinata's to carry it over to him, "It's time to go."

His expression wasn't any different from usual, not that Hinata could see anyway. It almost made Hinata think that all the mistakes he had made didn't actually matter, but the uncomfortable silence that persisted on their walk home made him reconsider.

He was so busy lamenting the recent events that he nearly missed Akashi's quiet question of why he hadn't crossed the street yet. Had Hinata really been so lost in thought that he hadn't realized they had stopped? And how'd they get here so fast anyway? Had he been unconsciously speed-walking?

The already blinking red light for his turn became solid, and the light for the road ahead turned white. Akashi gave him a slight bow before he crossed the street, walking away as he always did, posture straight and gait steady. It left Hinata feeling inexplicably lonely, or was there another word for this feeling in his chest?

* * *

The morning of the practice match against Ryumei Junior High, just a few minutes before they were scheduled to start, the first-years of Teiko basketball club's first string glanced around the gym, hoping to see the shortest of their bunch, who had still yet to arrive.

When the whistle for the line-up sounded, Aomine took another more extensive look around, "Hey, Akashi, where's the shorty?"

The doors slammed open then. Hinata came in all flailing limbs and gasping pants, "I'm sorry! I overslept! I'm sorry!"

"Oi, Chibi, your uniform's on backwards."

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

Aomine took a step back, almost sort of scared at Hinata's strange behavior and a little bit concerned, "You okay there, Chibi? Kinda looks like you're gonna pass out."

"I'm fine!" The way he jerked his head up like an alert rabbit said otherwise.

"Hey, you two!" Nijimura called them over from the line-up, "Hurry up!"

The two went to line up; although, Hinata had a few stumbles along the way that Aomine ended up helping him with. When they eventually reached the line-up, Aomine stole a few more glances at the trembling boy next to him, wondering if things were really alright like this and knowing that things were definitely not alright like this.

After the two teams bowed to each other, they headed back to their respective coaches for a huddle. Aomine listened with half an ear, already aware that this match was going to be just what they did during practice but on a larger scale. He knocked Hinata's head lightly with his knuckles after the huddle dispersed, miffed that it didn't break the lost stare from the small boy's face, "Hey, did you listen to anything at all?"

All he got was a tiny hum.

"You weren't at practice yesterday, so you don't know what we're doing."

Another hum.

Aomine felt his eye twitch. He jumped away from Hinata and made an odd sneer, "You're really creepy when you're sad. It's gross."

Another hum.

"Seriously. Like, seriously gross."

Just another hum.

Aomine loosened his posture as it was clear his ploy wasn't working. He actually looked Hinata over this time, properly examining Hinata for the first time since he arrived. There were circles under his usually vibrant eyes that were now glazed over with a dull sheen, a clear sign that he hadn't slept well that night. The way he was holding himself and the loose uniform draped over him made it seem like there was no muscle in his scrawny body, and Aomine wondered if he had eaten at all in the past 12 hours.

If they had more time, Aomine probably would have talked to him. Like, a proper talk. Probably.

For now, he pushed Hinata to his position and gave him a quick run down, "Just follow me around the court, and listen to Akashi whenever he says anything."

"Y-yes, sir!"

It really was creepy, seeing Hinata so anxious to the point of obedience.

With his superior height, Aomine scooped the jump ball to his chest and made a break for it. He noticed Hinata follow him up the court though not without a slight delay. Two blockers stepped into his path, forcing him to stop. He searched for others to pass to, someone preferably not Hinata, not when he was like this, frozen in fear by his own guard.

He saw Murasakibara's towering body charge forward. Having been a bit behind due to his lack of speed, he hadn't been marked. Aomine tossed him the ball as he passed and watched Murasakibara semi-trample the blockers who tried to get in his way (he didn't actually, even Murasakibara had enough sense to not foul this early into the game). He shot the ball from within the 2-point area, but it was knocked out of the air by Ryumei's large center and into the hands of the opposing team.

The fight moved onto Teiko's side of the court, but Hinata didn't follow it. Aomine gave him a passing slap on the back, scaring the kid shitless if his screaming said anything, "Hey, shut up! We're playing defense now. Get moving."

Luckily, Akashi knocked the ball out of the other team's hands before they could shoot. Aomine picked it up and immediately turned in the other direction, "Oi, Chibi! Quit spacing out!"

At least Hinata was lucid enough to keep pace with him. A blocker met him near the basket, so he passed the ball to Hinata, who, amazingly, caught it without fumbling. "Shoot it!"

The ball flew from Hinata's trembling fingers, sailing through the air, hitting the top of the rim and bouncing off. Aomine brushed past his inattentive blocker and jumped for the ball. He tapped it just enough for it to go over the edge and into the basket.

"I'm sorry!" Hinata shrieked and waved his arms in a panic. Aomine narrowed his eyes and scrunched his eyebrows, "What are you apologizing for? Seriously, stop it, and get your head in the game."

"I'm sorry!"

Aomine could feel the vein in his forehead pulsing, and he would have gone over to knock some sense into him if it weren't for the ball flying past his face. He wanted to bash his own head for missing such an easy steal. Ryumei scored an easy two points. Midorima sent them an unimpressed glare, and before he could start spouting his usual tirade, Aomine yelled at him, "I know already!"

"Then do something about it," was Midorima's quick retort.

"You don't think I'm trying?!" He may have been talking about both Hinata and him having been useless in the previous few seconds, but Hinata's current despondency was clearly the bigger issue right now. "Why am I the one dealing with this?! Oi, Akashi! He's your minion, you do something!"

Said redhead looked over from the endline, ball in hand and eyes unreadable, "Hinata."

He paused, seemingly thinking over his words. Eventually he said, "Keep doing what you're doing."

Aomine screamed at him from the other side of the court, "That's not helpful at all!"

Akashi ignored him and passed the ball to Midorima over by the sidelines, who ran with it and then passed it to Aomine when the opposing team caught up to him. The arc was high, so by the time Aomine caught it, the other team had already closed in on him. He had been surrounded, which made doing anything near impossible. He took a quick sweep of the court and calculated the distance between himself and the hoop. Could he make it from here? Might as well try.

He threw the ball high above their heads in an unexpected move and clicked his tongue when he realized it wasn't going to make it. As the ball started its descent down, an orange blur flew up towards it. Hinata cradled the ball in his hands above his head, and then he flicked his wrist just so to get the ball up again. He landed just as the ball stopped spinning against the rim and fell through the hoop.

Aomine slapped Hinata's back again, only this time he did it with a cheerful grin, "So you're alright after all. Jeez, you had us worried there."

"Oh, uh, sorry." For the first time that day Hinata looked at him with some life in his eyes, "I was just… If he's not mad, then I guess it's okay. I should probably still…"

"Hm?" Aomine leaned down to hear him better, but Hinata looked up again and said more clearly, "I'll try to give you the ball as much as possible."

He walked off, leaving Aomine frozen in shock. Hinata was willingly giving up the spotlight to Aomine. Hinata was willingly letting Aomine win. Hinata willingly admitted that Aomine was better than him. He basically did that. He basically just did that, right? "That's way weird! Totally weird! Creepy! Gross! Who are you?!"

True to his word, Hinata did send every ball he got to Aomine. Granted some of his passes missed, but it wasn't like Aomine was expecting Hinata's tragic aim to improve overnight. This strategy worked for a while until the other team realized that Hinata wasn't going to shoot. At that point, Akashi stepped in. It did not go as Aomine was expecting it to go.

Every time Akashi gave out a command, Hinata tried his best to do the exact opposite. The small boy was scared so stiff every time Akashi spoke that it was entirely possible he had genuinely misheard the orders.

The quarter didn't end nearly soon enough, in Aomine's opinion. He was half tempted to go yell at Shirogane and ask why he hadn't switched Hinata out or even called a time out at all during the first quarter, but he saw him speaking to Coach Sanada and Nijimura, both of whom looked very serious and very concerned as they eyed Hinata discretely from the bench.

Instead, Aomine walked over to where Akashi was wiping his face with a towel. He leaned over and whispered, "Did you and Chibi get into a fight or something?"

"No, not that I'm aware of." The expression Akashi was making held a subtle curiosity and urging for an explanation, like he really wasn't aware of any problems that could have prompted Aomine to ask him such a thing. "Did Hinata say that?"

"Well, no." Aomine glanced over at said boy, who was having his own conversation with Midorima and was looking more normal than he had been earlier but was still too gloomy for comfort. "It's probably just the Chibi then. But, if you could… I dunno, maybe, like… I'm no good at this stuff! Just take it easy on him, or something?"

"I do what is necessary for victory."

"Right, and isn't Hinata getting in the way of that right now?"

"Admittedly he is acting a bit strange, but this is a chance for him to gain experience that is unavailable elsewhere."

So it was Akashi who convinced Coach to not switch Hinata out? Aomine could definitely see that happening, but the coach did say that this match was for them, so that might not have been the case. Akashi was clearly making it more for Hinata than anyone else though. "Is this still about winning?"

"Of course it is." Akashi's smile morphed into something devious. "I am ensuring our future success."

He walked away after that. Aomine looked over at the bench where Hinata and Midorima were and wondered if their conversation was better than his had been. From the lively look on Hinata's face, he'd say yes.

Midorima could safely say that he had been 92% correct about Hinata. He was a simpleton and wasn't too bright, but there was an underlying maturity about him that Midorima was coming to realize. It was for this reason that the cause for Hinata's melancholy surprised him. "You're afraid that Akashi will be upset with you because you're not talented enough?"

Hinata ducked his head as his face flushed, "Well, when you say it like that…"

It was ridiculous, not because he didn't think Akashi wouldn't drop someone the moment their use expired (because he could definitely imagine that happening), but he couldn't imagine that happening to Hinata, or rather he couldn't imagine Hinata letting that happen. And yet, here the boy was, essentially letting that very thing happen, and Midorima couldn't understand why.

What happened to the tenacious kid who did everything he could to pass the aptitude test knowing that he wasn't good at studying, sacrificed lunches for more time to review notes and pestered Akashi to tutor him? The steadfast kid who broadcasted his resolve to better his basketball skills, determined not to get kicked off the first string? What happened to that guy?

"Forgive me if I'm being… presumptuous, but you don't seem like the type of person to worry about this kind of thing."

Hinata looked up curiously, brows scrunched in a way that would have been extremely cute had it been under any other circumstance, "Of course I'd be worried! I want to play with you guys."

"You are playing with us now, are you not?"

"Well, yes, but you know what I mean! If I mess up, Akashi might…"

"You've been making mistakes since the game started."

"Midorima-san," Hinata hung his head with tears in his eyes, "I thought you were supposed to be helping me."

Midorima rubbed his chin as he thought. He understood where Hinata was coming from. Akashi just had that kind of influence on people, making them feel inferior by just looking at them. Midorima had thought that Hinata had been immune to it seeing as the boy liked to follow Akashi around a lot. A delayed reaction then? "It's been almost a month, why are you worrying about this now?"

Hinata's lips tightened into a thin line, looking away as he held back frustrated tears, "It's because it's been nearly a month that I'm worried. I've gotten better, just a little, and it's not like Akashi's training isn't amazing or anything, because it is. He's super amazing. He always knows what to do and what I need…"

"But…?"

Hinata's shoulders drooped. He played with the hem of his uniform, folding and rubbing the loose fabric between his fingers, "I feel like… I've disappointed him."

"How pointless." Midorima pushed up his glasses, letting the glare of the mid-morning sun reflect off the lenses. He could understand Hinata's distress, honestly he could, and he did feel slightly bad at the flinch Hinata made at his words, but this was just too ridiculous. "Man proposes, God disposes."

Hinata blinked.

"Hinata-san, during the first quarter, you were thinking only of what you are not able to do, correct? Tell me, when Aomine missed that time, why did you jump?"

"'That time?' Oh, that. I was…"

"You did it because you knew you could."

Hinata nodded a bit hesitantly, baffled at the sudden passion Midorima was displaying.

"You're spending so much time worrying about what you _can't_ do that you aren't focusing on what you _can_ do. It's fine during practice when you are improving the areas you are lacking in, but during games, you must focus on your current capabilities. So, what can you do?"

"I-I don't know…"

"If you don't know, then let Akashi decide. Akashi knows your abilities perhaps even better than you do."

"Let Akashi decide…?" Like a lightbulb went off above his head, Hinata lit up, but a frown quickly formed on his face as another thought occurred to him, "But what if I mess up?"

"You are fearing Akashi's lack of respect for you. That, you must speak to Akashi himself about. However, what I can tell you is that the first step to gaining one's respect is to show _them_ respect."

"So… it's okay if I mess up?" Hinata asked meekly.

"Man proposes, God disposes," Midorima stated. He put away his water bottle and gave Hinata a stern look that he hoped was somewhat reassuring, "So long as you work hard, fate will handle the rest."

Hinata's eyes took on a sparkly polish. He jumped out of his seat with a wide grin, "Thanks, Midorima-san! You're really good at pep talks surprisingly!"

"S-surprisingly…?"

"I gotta talk to Akashi before the game starts again." With renewed energy, Hinata ran off.

Midorima went back to organizing his things, trying not to let Hinata's words get to him because he knew Hinata wasn't trying to be mean. He seemed to be oblivious to people's sore spots and tended to make comments that may or may not offend people, but his intentions were pure, Midorima knew. Still, he could have just not said that last part. "It's not like I'm your relationship counselor or anything."

"Mido-chin, are you a tsun?"

They all needed to learn a thing or two about shutting up.

As everyone was getting ready to get back on the court, Hinata hurried over to Akashi with a bright determined fire lighting his eyes, "Akashi!"

Right as the redhead turned toward him, Hinata bowed at the waist, head down, and arms straight by his sides, "I'm sorry! I'll do better this time, I promise! Just tell me what to do and I'll absolutely do it!"

Akashi blinked, looking the slightest bit lost, but he nodded anyway even though Hinata hadn't lifted his head yet, "Right. That's fine. Then, I'd like you to take the tip off."

Hinata's head shot up, "Yes, sir, Aka… Akashi-san!"

Hinata ran onto the court, tense and filled with determination. When Aomine went to follow him, he turned to see why Akashi hadn't moved at all for the past few seconds and found a strange, unreadable look in the redhead's eyes. It was a look that Aomine had never seen before, something dark in a way that he couldn't describe, and seeing it on Akashi's face just seemed wrong, "Hey, Akashi, you alright there?"

"No." Akashi didn't meet his eyes or turn to acknowledge him or do anything at all to make it seem like the response had been for that particular question. He just walked away. Again. Had that been an answer or a dismissal? Aomine didn't know. He shrugged it off, figuring it wasn't his problem.

Aomine got into position, and, seeing Hinata waiting impatiently in the middle of the court, he smirked. Looked like they were going to start this quarter off with a bang. Right as the whistle blew, Hinata flew up, and Aomine couldn't keep the grin off his face as he heard the crowd awe around them.

Hinata tipped the ball over to Akashi, who was just behind him. Akashi dribbled the ball forward, calling to Hinata as he passed, "Follow."

Even though he could have easily surpassed Akashi's speed and gotten in front, Hinata stayed a few steps behind as he had been told. They made it past their opponents with ease, but one particularly large player stood in their way when they neared the hoop.

"Jump."

Hinata didn't question it. He barely heard it, but he did as he was told. He jumped as high as he could, still a good distance from the hoop and heading for what looked like a crash course for the larger played in front of him. At the highest point of his jump, the ball was thrown at him. Hinata looked to Akashi down below and followed the redhead's eyes to the other side of the court. Barely conscious of his body moving with his eyes, Hinata threw the ball toward Aomine without a second thought, and then another quiet command came from Akashi just as Hinata's heart rate picked up at the awareness of an impending contact play. "Spin."

Hinata immediately twisted his body to the side, avoiding the other player's bulky body by mere millimeters. He landed on his hands and fell to knees, clutching his chest and panting as if he just had a minor heart attack, which was entirely justified if he had a say in anything. Crashing into someone was definitely bad, right? There's no way it wasn't bad. He could have fouled right there, could have possibly been taken out of the game. If Akashi hadn't told him to spin right then, Hinata would have totally freaked out and crashed.

He heard the ball swish through the hoop and looked up to see it falling just as the whistle for the point blew. He stood up and clapped his hands together to get rid of the dust and debris that had stuck. A slap on his back had him flailing to keep his balance. Aomine grinned as he gave the small boy a noogie, "What are you clapping for? Is that supposed to be pity? If anyone, you're the one who needs to be pitied."

"Ow! Ahomine, let go!"

"Oh, are you finally back to normal now?" Aomine dropped Hinata onto the floor uncaringly and still smiling. Hinata picked himself up with a grumble. He froze, eyes wide as he shouted, "Murakuma!"

Murasakibara came charging toward them, ball in one hand and the other tucked to his chest with his elbow jutting out, like he was ploughing through walls or something. The opposing team moved out of the way, likely terrified of being trampled and not willing to risk death for a measly penalty. At the hoop, Murasakibara jumped and flung the ball in. The ground seemed to shake when he landed.

Hinata and Aomine stood off to the side, faces frozen in a half-shocked half-horrified expression. Murasakibara towered over them, face as bored as ever as he said, "I want to score points, too."

Aomine blinked, face unchanged except for a shaky smile, "Un. You do that."

"Hinata," Akashi jogged over to their side for the throw-in. "When you see the target, steal the ball."

"Target?"

Akashi pointed to his eyes with a sly smile, "You'll see."

Target, meaning who the ball will be passed to, right? That was easy enough to figure out, but what was with the eyes thing? Hinata slide into position and glanced over at Akashi, who caught his gaze with his ever-easy smile before shifting his attention to the player at the endline.

Hinata fixed his eyes on the players movements, watching his arms swing back and forth trying to pick out someone to pass to. He watched his eyes stop on something far to the right, and Hinata knew just as the ball left the player's hands that was where he needed to be.

Midorima was closer though, shouldn't he leave the stealing to him? No. Akashi said he was to steal it, so that's what Hinata will do. Could he make it that far in time though? Ball's already in the air. No time to think. Go!

Hinata pushed off the floor, bolting towards his destination with his eyes locked on the ball. He couldn't afford to slow down, not until he intercepted the ball, so he pushed his legs and chose not to think of the very likely scenario of crashing into the wall. He spun his body in a poor attempt at killing his momentum and caught the ball close to his chest. He let the spin take him around, tossing the ball to a wide-eyed Midorima before he tripped over his own feet, momentum carrying him backwards for a few steps, but he somehow managed to stay upright long enough to see Midorima shoot the ball into the hoop with a clean swish.

Hinata stayed on the floor to catch his breath, wiping away the bit of sweat that had accumulated at his chin with his shirt. Midorima extended a hand for him and dragged him up with a small nod, "Nice steal."

Hinata smiled and nodded back. He looked over at Akashi a few feet away, who gave him his own encouraging smile. Hinata felt his lips twist up uncontrollably, and when Akashi tipped his head as a sign for the next play, he really couldn't help the fluttery feeling in his chest.

When half-time arrived, Hinata was back to being his high-spirited, bouncy self. He lavished Akashi with so much praise that it left the taller redhead with a tiny, miniscule, practically unnoticeable twitch in his eye. It was the most expressive the team had ever seen Akashi, so Aomine dragged Hinata away, fearing an explosion of unimaginable magnitude.

Akashi was called over by Nijimura after that, which allowed for the other first-years to quietly talk amongst themselves until they received a game plan from their coach, who at the moment looked content to sit idly by like he had been doing the entire match thus far, though he did frown a bit at something Akashi said to him.

"Akashi-san is amazing, isn't he?! He knew exactly what was going to happen even before it happened!"

"Shut up already," Aomine groaned, "Akashi this, Akashi that. We get it!"

Hinata stuck his tongue out at him, "You're just jealous."

"Of what?!"

"Midorima-san, what's wrong?"

"Oi!"

Midorima looked away from whatever he had been looking at. He stared down into Hinata's curious eyes but couldn't hold the gaze, so he looked off to the side, "Nothing, just that… perhaps I misread him."

Hinata tilted his head but didn't pry. Instead, he bounced over to where Murasakibara had just joined them with a bag of gummy bears, "Murakuma, you shouldn't eat so much all the time. It's mostly sugar, too."

"Inu-chin want some?"

"You already used that nickname. Are you recycling nicknames now?"

"Here." Murasakibara picked out a single gummy bear, waving it like he was preparing to throw it.

"Don't you dare throw it!"

"Murasakibara, put it away." Akashi joined their little circle, aura as imposing as ever. "Coach has put me in charge of the second half. He doesn't plan on switching anyone out, so you best be prepared to play the match for its entirety."

"Like we didn't know that already," Aomine said, wiping the sweat off his face with his black towel.

Akashi ignored him, "Positions will remain the same. Hinata, stick close to Aomine. You two will be the vanguard. We haven't had designated markers, and I don't believe that we need to. Guard as you see fit. Their center hasn't moved outside of their defending zone, but if he does, Murasakibara, he'll be your mark. Outside of that, stay close to the hoop. However, defending isn't a priority."

A glint appeared in his red eyes, "Attack and keep attacking. That is our plan. They may be older than us and more experienced, but we are stronger."

A wave of confidence flowed through the team, igniting a wild excitement that left them nearly breathless. There was so much adrenaline and anticipation that even stiff-faced Midorima cracked a little smile.

Aomine punched his fist into the air, "Alright! Now you're talking! Let's get 'em, Chibi!"

Hinata voiced his agreement with an exaggerated hop, spreading his limbs out as he did, much too excited to care about the jab at his height.

Midorima tuned out the two idiots' howling. He turned to address Akashi, "Are you sure about this? It's not much of a plan."

"Do you doubt me?" That mirthful smile was there again, reminding Midorima of what happened just after the last time he had seen it. He wasn't keen on suffocating under that animosity again. Tongue suddenly dry, Midorima gulped before he spoke again, "No, I am merely inquiring about your thought process."

Akashi hummed, "There's not much to it really. We are a new team that has yet to awaken our true talents. I'm simply using what is at this point in time the best that is at our disposal."

Midorima supposed that did make sense. Aomine and Hinata were primarily attackers from what he had examined during their practices. Neither really cared much for defending, though they might have actually been decent at it if they even bothered to defend. Murasakibara as well seemed to favor bulldozing across the court over guarding their own hoop, which left Midorima and Akashi, whose roles were supposed to be attack oriented, to pick up the slack.

"I'm rather surprised it worked out so well."

Midorima was startled out of his thoughts, astonished that Akashi was continuing the conversation. Akashi took no notice. He seemed genuinely happy, or at the very least pleased, watching the other first-years doing their own thing. "Everyone's found their own niche."

Midorima struggled to see what it was Akashi was seeing. It just looked like everyone was doing what they always did. Hinata and Aomine had started another argument over something that involved towel whips, whereas Murasakibara was getting his snacks confiscated by Nijimura, who was also yelling at the other two idiots while the rest of the first string looked reluctantly used to this. It said a lot about the first-years' personalities that everyone was already so resigned to accept that this chaos was now going to be their normal.

"I have a question," Akashi started up again, eyes going cold, "What did you say to Hinata?"

Midorima felt his heart stop. He didn't need to look to know that he had inadvertently aggravated an overprotective lion. The problem was, he didn't know what exactly he had done. "I… We discussed his lack of confidence in his own skills, which has been remedied, I believe, and also…"

Midorima paused. He felt that disclosing Hinata's worries about Akashi would be crossing some moral line. It may have involved Akashi, but there was no reason for Midorima to become the middleman for them, especially when they didn't need one; although, if it did get to that point, Midorima would have to take the position (more out of guilt-driven obligation to Hinata than want) as the only sensible classmate they had.

"Also…?" Akashi narrowed his eyes. Midorima could feel his resolve crumbling under that petrifying glare. Bit by bit, piece by piece. Finally, Midorima threw his head down and bowed as low as he could without falling over. He struggled to keep his voice from shaking, "I apologize. It is not my place to divulge that information."

He waited an agonizing minute, and then he heard Akashi sigh softly. Midorima tilted his head up to peek at Akashi, who had turned his back to him, "If you do not wish to say, then that's fine. However…"

Akashi turned his head just the slightest bit, and the sudden meeting of eyes was something Midorima had not been prepared for. He would never be prepared to face those livid red eyes nor the subzero tone that promised a hundred million things worse than death. "Do keep in mind, I do not like being disobeyed."

Midorima looked back down at his feet, feeling those eyes drill into him. The pressure intensified and continued to beat down on him until he finally managed to speak, "Yes… sir."

Seemingly satisfied, Akashi walked onto the court to prepare for the next half, leaving Midorima still bowing and trembling. He jumped when Hinata popped up beside him, "Midorima-san! Something wrong?"

Midorima put a hand to his chest and stood up stiffly to appear unperturbed, "Nothing. Did you need somethi—"

Midorima froze. He didn't dare try to see if Akashi was watching them, but considering the fact that he was still feeling the lingering effects of being beaten into the ground by simply being stared at, he didn't want to push his luck. He raised his hand to stop Hinata from speaking, "Apologies, Hinata-san. It'd be best if you spoke to someone else."

He walked away as fast as he could in a way that could still be considered walking, hoping he didn't appear as stiff as he was feeling.

Hinata blinked and tilted his head with a small furrow of his eyebrows. Aomine came up behind him, "So, did he say we can use his towel?"

Hinata shrugged.

The game started up again with additional fervor. As Akashi had ordered, Teiko attacked. The opposing team caught on to what they were doing fairly quickly, and though they did try defending for a good while, they were unable to shut down Hinata and Aomine's endless assault, so they ended up switching tactics and copy Teiko after a brief timeout.

Just like in the first half, Ryumei's center never left the area under the hoop, making him easy pickings for Aomine and Hinata, who finally decided to take a raincheck on their arguing. They did simple team plays, passing back and forth and essentially using each other to get further down the court, but with their combined speed it worked.

When Ryumei called another time out, Aomine made a beeline for Hinata and slung his arm over the shorter boy's shoulders, "You were way too slow. What was up with that? Can't keep up with me after all?"

"Yeah, right!" Hinata flung Aomine's arm off him. "I just can't run as fast when I'm dribbling. Besides, I'm totally faster than you, and you know it!"

"Like hell you are!"

"You two!" Nijimura yelled. He looked ready to suffer an aneurysm pinching the bridge of his nose like that and letting out a sigh that was the epitome of long-suffering. "Can you at least behave during a match?"

"Che, boring."

"Sorry, Captain."

Nijimura sighed again and sat back down, waving in the general direction of where he figured Akashi was standing, "They're all yours now."

Akashi nodded his thanks before speaking, "Hinata, if you're still having trouble running while dribbling—"

"No! I'll do it!"

Akashi blinked, his mouth closing into a thin line.

Aomine leaned down to whisper into Hinata's ear, keeping a watchful eye on Akashi as he did so, "I don't think interrupting him was a good idea."

Hinata stiffened and trembled, "Was it really?! I'm sorry, Akashi-san! It won't happen again, Akashi-san!"

"Oi, don't overdo it," Aomine hissed.

Akashi stayed still as a statue throughout their whole interaction. Eventually, he closed his eyes and said, "Alright, if you think you can handle it. I will still be giving you orders—"

"Of course! I'll listen, don't worry!"

Aomine nudged him to shut up.

Akashi only paused for a bit before he nodded.

As they jogged back onto the court to restart the game, Aomine muttered quietly to Hinata, "You're lucky that you're you. Anyone else would have been slaughtered."

"Hm?" Hinata looked up at him, "What does that mean?"

Aomine hummed, wondering for half a second if there was a possibility that Hinata would understand if he explained it, "Nothing. Nothing at all."

Ryumei's plan after this timeout was to constantly switch matchups. Since Teiko didn't have designated players to mark, the tactic didn't throw them off too much. After a few cycles, a lanky guy stayed as Hinata's mark. His reaction speed was pretty good, keeping up with Hinata's little twitches to prevent him from passing him, but he couldn't match Hinata's speed.

Hinata used the skills he learned in track to bypass his guard, getting to the hoop just in time for Aomine to toss the ball to him. The large center was there again, and he jumped to block the shot, but Hinata jumped higher. The ball hit the backboard and bounced against the rim before falling through the net.

Hinata's eyes glittered. He turned to the closest person, smiling uncontrollably, "Hey, hey, did you see that? It went in! It actually went in!"

Aomine, who had been free from any blocker on the other side of the net, slapped Hinata's head, causing the sparkles that had arose to disappear, "Don't be so surprised like it's a rare occurrence! Though it kind of is."

"But it went in!" The sparkles came back. "My first shot! I scored a point all by myself!"

Aomine dug his knuckles into Hinata's head, feeling a vein pulse on his own forehead, "What do you mean all by yourself?! I passed it to you, idiot!"

"Owwww! Stop it!"

Aomine let him go after a while, muttering as turned to walk back to a better position on the court. "Nice shot though, I guess."

It had been so quiet and so slurred together that Hinata thought he heard wrong. Aomine never complimented him, not even as a passing remark. Maybe in a joking manner sure, but never seriously. Hinata sucked in a deep breath to calm the pitter-patter of his heart.

"Hinata," Akashi beckoned him over, "Steal the ball whenever possible."

"Yes, sir!" Hinata replied giddily, still a bit winded and jittery from the sudden influx of feelings.

He didn't get to the ball in time to steal the next throw-in unfortunately. Murasakibara blocked the player with the ball, and seeing an opportunity, Hinata reached for it. He wanted to tap the ball just enough to get the player to fumble, there had been a clear instance where that was possible, but the player turned around unexpectedly, stopping his dribble and holding the ball close to his chest just as Hinata appeared behind him. He timed it so perfectly that it was almost like he had eyes in the back of his head. When Murasakibara leaned over to save Hinata from face-planting into the floor, the lanky player holding the ball took the open shot that they presented him.

Hinata searched for Akashi, bowing frantically when he finally caught the redhead's eye, "I'm sorry! It won't happen again!"

"No, that's alright," Akashi replied, his eyes calculating, "Keep doing that until I tell you otherwise."

It wasn't just the lanky power forward who could do that trick. The other Ryumei players could also do it all to varying degrees. After the sixth time a player dodged Hinata's steal, Akashi gave his new orders, "Hinata, limit your steals to only throw-in balls, and try to hold the ball for as long as you can when you get it."

Hinata nodded. He didn't understand, but he'd do it.

Akashi threw the ball in to Hinata, who immediately took off down the court. He was stopped in the middle by Lanky guy. Hinata leaned to and fro, trying to find a way past while keeping his dribbling controlled.

From behind his own blocker, Akashi called out to him, "Hinata, karate."

Like something clicked into place, Hinata flicked the ball up into the air from behind. What happened after that was too fast for anyone to comprehend. All they knew was that somehow Hinata had gotten behind his mark, but was for some reason sitting on the ground with a leg stuck in between his opponent's.

Hinata carefully squeezed out a tense breath but didn't release his body from the side split position it had taken, "That was close. Way too close. I nearly didn't stop in time."

Akashi picked up the ball Hinata had tossed into the air. While everyone had their attention on Hinata, Akashi passed the ball to Murasakibara by the hoop. People only started moving again after the whistle, and even that was a bit late. The buzzer signaling the end of the quarter rang soon afterwards.

Hinata carefully extricated his leg, apologizing to the player above him as he did. He took the hand that was offered to him gratefully and rejoined his teammates. Akashi nodded to him when he arrived and started laying out the plans for the last quarter, "I suspect they'll send their center out for the last quarter. When they do, Aomine, keep his attention. Hinata, hold back for now. I'll let you know when you can go all out again. Midorima, Murasakibara, give them support. You can leave defending to me."

They all nodded. None of them were going to defy Akashi no matter how many questions they wanted to ask.

Murasakibara lumbered to the bench after their huddle dispersed. He picked around the general area of the bench looking for something. He picked up his water bottle that had been left on the bench and shook it, frowning at the small swishing sounds of the little drops of water left in the container. He put the bottle down.

Aomine looked over from his spot on the bench, "Yo, big guy, whatcha looking for?"

"Hungry."

Hinata popped his head over from the other side of the bench, "I have some energy bars you can have. My mom always packs a lot for me whenever I go out."

He dropped an innocently packaged energy bar in Murasakibara's large hand. Murasakibara blinked a few times, trying and failing to make sense of what he was seeing, "What is this?"

"An energy bar. You know, something kind of healthy."

"It says soy. What kind of person eats soy? Soy isn't energy."

"I don't know. My mom just likes buying it. You'll eat anything though, won't you? Just eat it."

"Don't wanna." Murasakibara held the hand with the bar out to Hinata, offering it back.

"Well, I don't want it either. Keep it."

"Don't wanna."

"Just put it in your bag."

"Don't wanna."

"Gross," Aomine commented, "Pineapple soy? What is this thing?"

"Murasakibara," Akashi called from the court, "Take the tip off."

"Fine."

When the whistle blew, Murasakibara pushed the ball over to where Aomine was already running down the court. Hinata followed after him. He watched Aomine pass two players with ease, and Hinata acquired newfound respect for the taller boy after experiencing himself how difficult getting past blockers while dribbling truly was.

Aomine did end up being stopped by the large Ryumei center, who had finally left the inner circle of his hoop. He passed the ball to Hinata on his left, being the only one who didn't have a mark nearby. Hinata jumped, the ball above his head and his right hand ready to toss it up, but a Ryumei player leaped toward him and shot up in front of him with his arms high above his head. Hinata knew he wasn't skilled enough to attempt a high arc shot, and if he were to be perfectly honest, he hadn't been planning to make a shot so far from the hoop in the first place, so he darted his eyes back down to Aomine, finding he had switched positions to Hinata's left.

Hinata brought the ball down with his right hand and let it fall by his side before he scooped it out of the air and flung it one-handed across his back to Aomine. Aomine ran and scored a layup before anyone noticed anything.

Hinata ran up to him with his hands held high and a big grin on his face. Aomine gave him a funny look, "What?"

Hinata waved his hands in the air, looking especially eager. Aomine furrowed his brows and hummed, "Mmm, you want to be picked up? Sorry, Chibi, that's not my thing. Go ask the big guy."

Hinata slapped both his hands against Aomine's chest, cheeks puffed out and hopping angrily, "It's called a high five, idiot!

"What for?"

"Team play! We did a team thing right there!"

"But all you did was pass it."

"Still teamwork!"

Hinata darted away, having caught the ball being thrown in from the corner of his eye. He pushed the ball out of its path and ran with it to toss it over to Murasakibara, who scored an easy two points with it.

The next throw-in took a little more time. Ryumei was obviously being more cautious of Hinata and his speedy steals. Just when Hinata started for his target, Lanky guy appeared in front of him, blocking his way. He kept Hinata away from the fight that had gone to the other end of the court, shifting when Hinata did and leaping when Hinata ran.

On the other end, Akashi managed to get the ball back and passed it off to Midorima, who was currently running back to where Hinata was still trying to escape his mark. Hinata had been pushed to the area under the hoop with no clear way out. He gasped when he saw Midorima jump from just behind Lanky, focused on the hoop above them and ready to shoot with Lanky none the wiser.

Midorima was right there, _right there_ behind him, why didn't Lanky jump? It wasn't just Lanky either. All the Ryumei players were beginning to become oddly inattentive. Perhaps they were just getting tired. There hadn't been many timeouts this game, so that was likely. Still…

Hinata broke past his mark and ran toward another Ryumei player, who turned his head when he approached, letting Murasakibara run past him. Murasakibara, _over 180 centimeters_ , slipped by with the ball without them noticing. It was only when the sound of the ball slamming against the floor began fading away did they react, but by then it was too late. Murasakibara scored a three-pointer completely free of guards.

Akashi moved forward onto Ryumei's side of the court, leaving Teiko's completely unguarded. His eyes were sharp and focused, not on the game but rather scrutinizing the Ryumei players. He nodded to Hinata and gave a look to Midorima and Murasakibara, only one of whom looked like he understood the signal. When Ryumei tossed the ball in, Hinata mistimed it and missed the ball. Luckily, Akashi slapped the ball out of the player's hands right when it got there. It bounced to Midorima, who immediately passed it to Hinata.

Caught off guard, Hinata stumbled back a few steps before running off. He searched for a good spot to shoot from being so close to the hoop already, but all the Ryumei players were running toward him. He saw Aomine raise his hand from below the hoop, so he threw the ball over, and they scored another easy two points.

Hinata skated around the court, stealing as many of the throw-ins as he could, which wasn't as many as he would have liked since Ryumei had taken to using fakes. He couldn't stop though. Akashi said go all out, which meant keep running and don't stop running. With everyone on the team passing the ball to him the second they got it, he couldn't even think about stopping.

He could never shoot however. Ryumei's players were always chasing him, never giving him an opportunity to make a shot, so Hinata would send the ball to Aomine, the only one to not pass it immediately back to him. A lot of his passes were shot down of course, but Hinata would always dive to pick the ball back up and try again. And the times he failed, Aomine was there to back him up. And when they both failed, it was Akashi who cleaned up after them, which happened more and more often as the Ryumei players seemed to focus on Aomine as much as they were Hinata.

As the game neared its end, Hinata searched for anyone free to take the ball from him. He noticed Aomine halt behind him, stopped by his own mark, but he was in a good position. Hinata met his gaze, and they both grinned as the same idea came to their heads.

Hinata passed the ball back in Akashi's general direction, knowing without a doubt that the redhead would get the ball back to him. Not having to protect the ball anymore, Hinata dashed past his guard, Aomine following soon after.

Akashi slammed the ball out of Ryumei's hands and back toward the other side of the court, where Hinata swiftly picked it up. He passed it off to Aomine, who dribbled it forward towards the large center who somehow managed to get back to his position by the hoop. Making a successful shot was unlikely, but...

Aomine grinned when that funny feeling nudging the back of his head was there again. Closer, closer, just a little more. He screeched to a stop in front of the other player, grinning as he crouched and tossed the ball over his shoulder, "It's yours, Chibi-chan."

Ryumei's center had been ready for it, but Hinata pressed a hand onto Aomine's back as he karate-palm-striked the ball toward the hoop up and over the center's head. It wasn't quite a shot, and it did spin against the rim a few times too many to be comfortable, but it went in after the buzzer signaling the end of the game went off, and that was what counted. "Alright! Though it was kinda close there."

"Idiot!" Aomine ground his knuckles into Hinata's head, "If you're gonna shoot, do it right! You're not reliable enough yet to do whatever you want! And watch where you put your feet! You nearly kicked my head with that jump!"

"Ow! Owowowowow!" Hinata grabbed his head after Aomine let go, rubbing away the pain.

"But…"

Hinata looked up, surprised at the quiet calmness of Aomine's voice. The bluenet lifted his hand up above his head, all bright eyes and white teeth, "Nice shot."

Hinata leaped up to connect his small hand with his, both grinning and realizing that, though they may butt heads a lot, they've always known in some instinctive way that they would work terrifyingly well together.

* * *

 **14k! This chapter really should have been split, but I was already writing the game that I didn't think would be that long (8k!) plus I already passed the date I wanted to update anyway and so I was committed.**

 **I also hate having unresolved subplots (read: drama) that drag on and am very unhappy at how OOC the characters became this chapter (** _ **especially**_ **Hinata goddammit I can't believe I did that to him** _ **again**_ **where the heck is my sunshine boy), but I can't do anything because I can't think of anything else and this gives way more room for relationship developments. Plus it's fanfiction.**

 **I AM COMMITTED!**


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